-.:# 


wo/^Anr> 


JMPli 


jOld  and  ne>\ 

CONNECTED  IN  THE  HISTORY  OF 

THK 

JEWS  AND  NEIGHBOURING  NATIONS, 

FKOM     THE 

Declensions  of  the  Kingdoms  of  Israel  and  Jodaii 

TO    TI|E 

/ 

BY  HUMPHREY   PRIDE AUX,  D.D. 

DEAN    OP    NORWICH. 


TO    WHICH    IS    NOW    ADDED, 

THE  LIFE  OF  THE  AUTHOR, 

CONTAINING    SOME    LETTERS    WHICH    HE    WROTE    IN    DEFENCE    AND    II.i.US- 
TRATION    OF    CERTAIN    PARTS    OF    HIS    CONNEXIONS. 

ILLUSTRATED   WITH    EIGHT    NEW    MAPS    AXD    PLATED. 

IN  THREE  VOLUMES. 

VOL.   I. 


BOSTON: 
PUBLISHED    BY    CUMMINGS    AND    IIILLIARD. 


J,  t  J.  Harper,  Printers. 
1323. 


ksf^/ll 


i«s 


^>vv  A 


To  the  Right  Honourable  DANIEL,  Earl  of 
Nottingham^  President  of  his  Blajestxfs  most 
honourable  Privy  Council. 
My  Lord, 

IT  being  by  your  recommendation  to  your 
noble  father,  that  I  was  by  him  made  prebenda- 
ry of  the  cathedral  church  of  Norwich,  while 
he  was  Lord  Chancellor  of  England,  and  it 
being  also  by  your  Lordship's  like  favourable 
recommendation  of  me  to  her  late  Majesty 
Queen  Anne,  that  I  was  promoted  to  be  Dean 
of  the  same  church,  I  humbly  offer  unto  your 
Lordship  this  product  of  my  studies,  in  a 
grateful  acknowledgment  of  the  favours  I  have 
received  from  you.  And,  if  the  public  receive 
any  benefit  from  it  (as  I  hope  some  may,)  no- 
thing is  more  just  and  reasonable,  than  that 
they  should  receive  it  through  your  Lordship's 
hands,  who,  in  having  been  so  much  a  patron 
to  the  Author,  have  acquired  thereby  the  best 
title  to  all  the  fruits  of  mv  labours.     What  I 


4  DEDTCATIOX. 

now  oftbr  unto  your  Lordship  is  only  the  first 
part  of  what  is  intended.  If  God  gives  life, 
the  second  shall  follow,  and  beg  its  passage 
into  the  world  under  the  same  patronage. 
The  only  additional  favour  I  am  now  capable 
of  receiving,  is  your  Lordship's  kind  accep- 
tance of  this  expression  of  my  gratitude ; 
which  I  humbly  pray  from  your  hands;  and  I 
am, 

My  Lord, 

Your  most  obedient,  and 

Most  obliged  humble  Servant, 
HUMPHREY  PRIDEAUX. 


THE  AUTHORS  LIFE. 


Dr.  Humphrey  Prideaux  was  born  at  Padstow,  in  the 
county  of  Cornwall,  on  the  3d  of  May,  A.  D.  1648,  being 
the  third  son  of  Edmund  Prideaux,  Esq.  by  Bridgett  his  wife, 
who  was  the  daughter  of  John  Movie  of  Bake,  Esq.  in  the 
same  county.  He  was  by  both  his  parents  descended  from 
ancient  and  honourable  families,  well  known  in  that  county. 
The  doctor  being  a  younger  brother,  and  designed  by  his 
parents  for  the  church,  as  soon  as  he  was  of  fit  age  he  was 
sent  abroad  to  school,  first  to  Liskard,  in  Cornwall,  then  to 
Bodmin,  in  the  same  county,  and  from  thence  removed  to 
Westminster,  under  the  famous  Dr.  Busb}',  where  he  was 
soon  chosen  King's  scholar ;  and  after  having  been  in  that 
college  three  years,  was  from  thence  elected  to  Christ-church, 
Oxford,  and  admitted  into  a  student's  place  in  theyear  1668, 
by  Dr.  John  Fell,  dean  of  that  college ;  and  in  Trinity  Term. 
A.  D.  1672,  he  commenced  bachelor  of  arts. 

As  soon  as  he  had  taken  that  degree,  lie  was  employed  by 
Dr.  Fell,  who  had  at  that  time  the  management  of  the  public 
printing-press  in  that  university,  in  an  edition  of  Lucius 
Florus,  and  directed  to  add  notes  thereto, 'which  he  did  ac- 
cordingly. These  notes  contain  only  references  to  other  au- 
thors, showing  where  other  ancient  historians  have  treated 
more  at  large  of  matters,  which  Florus  has  only  related  in 
epitome. 

After  this,  there  was  put  into  his  hands,  out  of  the  Bodleian 
library,  a  manuscript  copy  of  Johannes  AntiochenusMalela. 
a  Greek  historian,  in  order  to  have  it  fitted  for  the  press  by 
his  care  :  but  he,  on  perusing  it,  thought  it  a  very  fabulous 
and  trifling  book,  not  worth  the  printing ;  and  upon  his  giving 
this  judgment  of  it.  the  design  was  quite  laid  aside.  This 
book,  however,  has  been  since  published  by  the  learned  Dr. 
Hody,  professor  of  Greek  in  the  same  university. 

About  this  time,  the  doctor  had  the  misfortune  to  lose  his 
brother  Nicholas,  for  whom  he  had  conceived  a  particular 
affection,  on  account  of  his  promising  parts,  and  the  great 
progress  he  had  made  in  literature.  He  died  of  the  small- 
pox, in  the  eighteenth  year  of  his  age.  at  Corpus  Chris  ficoWege. 


tj  THE  AUTHOR'S  LIf  K. 

Oxon,  where  he  had  been  a  scholar  three  years  ;  and  Jies 
buried  in  the  cloister  near  the  chapel,  with  a  mural  monu- 
ment erected  to  his  memory,  which  is  still  to  be  seen  there. 
It  was  about  this  time  that  the  Lord  Henry  Howard,  then 
earl  of  Norwich,  and  afterward  duke  of  Norfolk,  made  a 
present  to  the  university  of  Oxford,  of  those  marbles,  which 
are  called  the  Arundel  marbles,  being  the  collection  of  his 
grandfather  Thomas,  earl  of  Arundel :  and  these  being  set 
up  in  the  court  before  the  theatre,  as  there  were  several 
very  curious  and  valuable  inscriptions  upon  them,  it  was 
thought  proper,  that  they  should  be  published  with  a  comment 
to  explain  them  ;  and  Mr.  Humphrey  Frideaux,  at  that  time 
the  only  bachelor  of  arts,  was  appointed  to  this  work.  Accord- 
ingly he  undertook  it,  and  two  years  afterward,  in  May, 
1676,  published  his  book,  entitled  Marmora  Oxoniensia,  in 
one  volume  in  folio,  printed  at  the  university  press,  and  dedi- 
cated to  the  said  earl  of  Norwich.  In  this  work  he  has  given 
us  all  the  aforesaid  inscriptions  at  large,  with  a  comment 
after  each,  tending  to  illustrate  and  explain  them,  and  has 
added  by  way  of  appendix,  an  account  of  some  marbles  col- 
lected by  Mr.  Selden,  and  Scrtorius  Ursatus's  Commentarhis 
de  noiis  Romanorum.  This  book  being  published  when  he  was 
but  twenty-six  years  of  age,  a  year  after  he  had  taken  his 
master  of  arts  degree,  gained  him  great  reputation  in  the  uni- 
versity, and  was  well  received  in  the  world,  especially  among 
foreigners  in  Germany,  France,  and  Italy ;  and  the  demand 
for  it  among  the  learned  was  such,  that  it  grew  very  scarce 
within  a  few  years  after  it  had  been  printed,  and  was  not  to 
be  had,  but  at  an  advanced  price.  The  learned  Huetius  in 
his  Demonstratio  Evangelica,  prop.  4.  cap.  2.  §  14,  says  of  it, 
"  Plurima  hujusmodisuppeditat  Liber  Inscriptionum  Gruteri  : 
at  nihil  in  hoc  genere  marmora  Oxoniensia  ajquiparate  queat, 
quibus  Insigniores  Priscorum  Grascorum  Epochas,  Foedus 
Smyrnaeorum  et  Magnentium,  aliaque  egregia  vetustatis 
Monumenta  inscripta  sunt."  This  book  has  suffered  much  in 
passing  through  the  press,  and  is  full  of  typographical  errors  ; 
which  was  owing  to  the  negligence  of  the  public  corrector 
of  the  university  press,  who  took  no  sort  of  Care  in  correct- 
ing it,  but  suffered  it  to  come  out  with  all  the  faults,  as  it 
came  from  thence.  The  author  for  these  and  other  reasons 
(particularly  as  he  was  called  upon  for  a  sheet  every  week, 
whether  he  was  ready  or  not)  never  had  any  opinion  or  es- 
teem for  this  work,  and  speaks  of  it  himself  in  his  preface  in 
the  following  manner:  "Ac  sic  tandem  postexactum  Annispa- 
tium  iisdem  semper  gradibus,  quibus  typographus  progressus 
faciens,  operi  meo  citius  timeo  quam  felicius  finem  imposui, 
illudque  jam  trado,  candide  Lector,  in  manus  tuas  :  si  in  eo 
jnvenias  me  aliquid  rectins  dicere.  iitere  in  c^mmoHum  tniim  j 


THE  AtiTHOK's  LII'K.  . 

SI  iu  uoiHiuUis  errasse,  ne  incuses;  spectes  aetaieni  wieam; 
spectes  difBcillimas  scribendi  conditiones  ;  reputa  quam  pauci 
sunt  qui,  in  his  circumstantiis  positipossunt  melius  :  iis  igitur 
condona  quicquid  in  hoc  opere  culpandum  est :  a  maturioribus 
studiis  si  Deus  vitam  dederit  et  valetudinem  ferendis  Labo- 
ribus  idoneam,  spera  meliora." 

Mr.  Prideaux  having  been  ordered  at  the  first  publication 
of  this  book  to  present  one  to  the  lord  chancellor  Finch,  this 
introduced  him  into  his  lordship's  patronage,  who  soon  after 
sent  to  him,  at  Christ-church,  Mr.  Charles  Finch,  one  of  his 
lordship's  sons,  to  be  his  pupil.  He  was  afterward  elected 
fellow  of  All  Souls  College,  and  there  commenced  doctor  of 
laws  ;  but  died  soon  after,  before  he  could  make  any  appear- 
ance in  the  world. 

In  the  beginning  of  the  year  1679,  the  rectory  of  St. 
Clemens  in  Oxford,  which  is  in  the  gift  of  the  great  seal, 
falling  void,  Mr.  Prideaux  was  by  the  lord  chancellor  Finch 
presented  to  it,  and  instituted  and  inducted  accordingly. 
This  living  he  served  constantly  for  several  years. 

The  same  year  Mr.  Prideaux  published  two  tracts  out  of 
Maimonides  in  Hebrew,  to  which  he  added  a  Latin  translation 
and  annotations.  The  book  bears  the  title  of  Dejure  Pmi- 
peris  et  Peregrini  apiid  JridcEos.  This  he  did  in  consequence 
of  his  having  been  appointed  Dr.  Busby's  Hebrew  lecturer 
in  the  college  of  Christ-church  ;  and  his  principal  view  in 
printing  this  book  was  to  introduce  young  students  in  the 
Hebrew  language  into  t!ie  knowledge  of  the  Rabinical  dia- 
lect, and  to  teach  them  to  read  it  without  points. 

In  the  latter  end  of  the  year  1680,  the  parliament  meeting 
at  Oxford,  he  attended  on  the  lord  chancellor  Finch  there  as 
his  chaplain;  but  this  was  of  short  continuance;  for  the 
parliament  was  dissolved  within  ten  days  after  its  first  meeting. 
The  12th  of  May  following  his  patron  the  lord  Finch  was 
created  earl  of  Nottingham  on  the  decease  of  Charles  Howard, 
the  last  Earl  of  Nottingham  of  that  family,  by  whose  death 
tlie  title  was  now  become  extinct. 

About  midsummer  following,  A.  D.  1681,  Dr.  Herbert 
Astley,  dean  of  Norwich,  dying,  Dr.  John  Sharp,  formerly 
chaplain  to  the  said  lord  chancellor,  prebendary  of  Norwich, 
and  rector  of  St.  Giles  in  the  Fields,  was  promoted  to  that 
deanery ;  upon  which  his  prebend  in  that  church,  which  was  in 
the  gift  of  the  great  seal,  falling  void,  the  lord  chancellor  wrote 
a  very  kind  letter  to  Mr.  Prideaux  at  Oxford,  to  let  him  know 
that  he  gave  it  him ;  and  accordingly  on  the  15th  of  August 
after,  he  was  installed  into  it,  and  kept  his  first  residence  at 
that  church,  in  the  months  of  December  and  January  follow- 
ing. The  other  prebendaries  of  the  same  church,  at  Mr. 
Prideanx's  first  admission  into  it  were.  Mr.  Joseph  Loveland. 


8  TfJE  AUTHOR  b  LIFE. 

Dr.  Hezekiah  Burton,  Dr.  William  Hawkins,  Dr.  William 
Smyth,  and  Mr.  Nathaniel  Hodges:  but  Dr.  Burton  dying 
soon  after,  Mr.  Richard  Kidder,  afterward  dean  of  Peterbo- 
rough, and  bishop  of  Bath  and  Wells,  succeeded  him.  With 
him  Mr.  Prideaux  contracted  a  very  particular  friendship, 
which  continued  to  the  time  of  Dr.  Kidder's  death,  who 
was  unfortunately  killed  by  the  fall  of  the  roof  of  his  bed- 
chamber, in  the  great  storm^  A.  D.  1703. 

On  the  13th  of  November,  1682,  Mr.  Prideaux  was  admit- 
ted to  the  degree  of  bachelor  in  divinity,  and  soon  after  had 
the  misfortune  to  lose  his  patron,  the  lord  chancellor  Notting- 
ham, who  died  on  the  18th  of  November  following,  and  was 
succeeded  by  sir  Francis  North,  lord  chief  justice  of  the  Court 
of  Common  Pleas. 

On  the  17th  of  February,  A.  D.  1682-3,  he  was  instituted 
to  the  rectory  of  Bladen  cum  Capclla  de  Woodstock,  in  the 
county  of  Oxford.  Dr.  Thomas  Marshall,  then  dean  of 
Gloucester,  and  rector  of  Lincoln  College,  was  his  predecessor 
in  this  living,  who  having  resigned  it,  Mr.  Prideaux  was  pre- 
sented thereto,  by  the  lord  keeper  North,  it  being  in  the  gift 
of  the  great  seal,  held  it  with  his  student's  place,  at  Christ- 
church,  by  virtue  of  his  being  library  keeper  of  that  college  ; 
for  as  there  is  no  salary  belonging  to  that  office,  except  forty 
shillings  per  annum  paid  to  a  deputy,  the  student,  who  has  it, 
has  the  privilege  of  holding  one  living  without  vacating  his 
student's  place  by  his  institution  thereto. 

On  the  13th  of  October,  A.  D.  1GC3,  Mr.  Prideaux  lost  his 
father,  who  died  in  the  78th  year  of  his  age.  He  was  de- 
scended of  a  family,  that  had  flourished  in  many  places  both 
in  Cornwall  and  Devonshire,  at  Prideaux,  Orcharton,  Ad- 
deston,  Thuborough,  Soldon,  Nctherton,  Ford  Abby,  and 
Padstovv ;  as  appears  from  the  herald's  books,  Camden, 
Leland's  Ilinerarij,  Fidlers  pVorihies,  Risdon's  Survey  of 
Devon,  Carrro's  Srirvei/  of  Cornu-all,  and  Princess  Worthies  of 
Devon;  who  all  make  honourable  mention  of  this  family, 
lie  was  a  i^eutleman  of  great  worth,  sobriety,  and  discretion, 
and  well  learned  in  mosc  parts  of  literature,  that  became  a 
gentleman  to  know.  He  studied  tirst  at  Sidney  College  in 
Cambridge,  where  he  was  under  the  care  of  Dr.  Paul  Michel- 
thwayt,  afterward  master  of  the  temple  :  from  thence  re- 
moved to  Exeter  college  in  Oxford  at  the  invitation  of  Dr. 
John  Prideaux,  then  rector  of  that  college  ;  and  from  thence 
he  went  to  the  Inns  of  Court,  in  order  to  make  himself  ac- 
quainted with  the  laws  of  the  realm  ;  and  after  this  travelled 
abroad,  and  spent  some  time  in  foreign  countries.  Ey  these 
means  he  improved  his  natural  understanding,  and  acquired 
those  accomplishments,  which  made  him  honoured  and  res- 
pected beyond  most  of  his  time  in  the  conntv  where  he  lived  : 


f.HK    AUTHOR'S  LIFE.  9 

to  which  he  was  very  useful  in  the  commission  of  the  peace 
and  Heutenancy.  From  the  restoration  to  the  time  of  his 
death,  he  had  the  chief  management  of  affairs  in  the  county 
of  Cornwall,  which,  on  account  of  his  known  wisdom  and 
integrity,  were  mostly  referred  to  him. 

Mr.  Prideaux  now  wholly  gave  himself  up  to  his  studies, 
and  attended  to  the  duties  of  his  function,  going  constantly  to 
Kladen  and  Woodstock  every  Sunday  from  Christ-church. 
And  that  there  might  be  no  deficiency  in  the  ministerial  du- 
ties at  any  time,  he  kept  a  curate  resident  at  Woodstock,  to 
attend  them  ;  so  that  both  churciies  were  constantly  served 
morning  and  afternoon  every  Sunday. 

And  that  they  might  always  continue  to  be  so  served,  Dr^ 
Fell,  who  was  then  bishop  of  Oxford,  as  well  as  dean  of  Christ- 
church,  projected  the  building  an  house  for  the  minister  of 
Woodstock;  and  having  accordingly  purchased  apiece  of 
ground  on  the  left-hand  of  the  gate,  going  into  the  park  from 
the  town  of  Woodstock,  and  formed  the  model  for  the  house  ; 
committed  the  care  of  building  it  to  Mr.  Prideaux,  under 
whose  direction  it  was  finished  in  the  year  1685,  and  after- 
ward  settled  for  the  use  of  the  minister  for  ever,  in  case  he 
shall  reside  thereon  ;  otherwise  for  the  use  of  the  poor  of 
the  town  of  Woodstock.  It  is  built  in  the  form  of  a  cross, 
upon  the  park  wall  over  against  Chaucer's  house.  The 
purchase  of  the  ground,  and  the  building  of  the  new  house 
thereon,  was  wholly  at  the  expense  of  the  learned  and  pious 
bishop  Fell,  which  cost  him  above  600/.  but  the  converting 
the  old  house,  which  stood  there  before,  into  out-houses  and 
offices,  and  fitting  up  the  same,  was  wholly  at  the  charge  of 
Mr.  Prideaux. 

From  the  time  that  he  was  master  of  arts,  and  a  tutor  in 
the  college,  he  was  always  very  zealous  and  diligent  in  re- 
forming such  disorders  and  corruptions,  as  had  from  time  to 
time  crept  into  it;  and  made  use  of  all  opportunities  in 
his  power  for  suppressing  them.  This  of  course  drew  on 
him  the  ill-will  of  many  of  his  fellow-collegians,  as  must 
always  happen  to  those,  who  endeavour  at  the  reformation 
of  discipline.  But  at  the  same  time  he  had  the  friendship  and 
esteem  of  the  best  men,  and  such  whose  reputation  was 
highest  in  the  university ;  particularly  of  bishop  Fell,  Dr. 
Pocock,  the  learned  Hebrew  and  Arabic  professor.  Dr.  Mar- 
shall, dean  of  Gloucester,  and  rector  of  Lincoln  college,  Dr. 
Bernard,  Savilian  professor  of  astronomy.  Dr.  Mills,  the  edi- 
tor of  the  Greek  Testament,  Dr.  Henry  Godolphin,  late  dean 
of  St.  Paul's,  Mr.  Guise  of  All  Souls  College,  and  many 
other  learned  and  valuable  men. 

On  the  6th  of  February,  A.  D.  1684-5.  died  king  Charles 

Vol,  T.  '         i  ' 


10  THE    author's    LIFL. 

the  lid,  and  his  brother  James  the  lid  was  pioclauned  kmt; 
the  same  day.  The  summer  following  happened  the  invasion!- 
of  the  earl  of  Argyle  in  Scotland,  and  the  duke  of  Monmouth 
in  England,  which  having  both  miscarried,  and  both  the  con- 
ductors of  them  being  cut  off,  king  James  now  looked  upon 
himself  as  thoroughly  settled  on  the  throne ;  and  began  to 
take  open  measures  for  subjecting  these  realms  to  popish  su- 
perstition. At  the  same  time,  bishop  Fell  declining  very  fast 
in  health,  Mr.  Prideaux  foresaw  the  confusion,  which  after- 
ward followed  in  the  college  upon  his  decease,  when  the 
king  imposed  a  popish  dean  to  succeed  him ;  and  therefore 
determined  to  retire  from  it,  and  settle  on  his  cure,  and  on  the 
l6th  of  February,  A.  D,  1G86-6,  he  married  Mrs.  Bridgets 
Bokenham,  only  daughter  of  Anthony  Bokenham  of  Helming- 
ham  in  the  county  of  Suffolk,  Esq.  who  was  the  son  of  ti 
younger  brother  of  sir  Henry  Bokenham  of  Thornham,  in  the 
county  of  Suffolk  ;  and  her  mother  was  the  daughter  of  Tho- 
mas Townsend  of  Horstead,  in  the  county  of  Norfolk,  Esq. 

In  the  year  1G86,  at  the  public  act,  Mr.  Prideaux  proceeded 
doctor  of  divinity  ;  and  having  exchanged  his  living  of  Bladen 
rum  Woodstock,  for  the  rectory  of  Saham  in  Norfolk,  as  soon 
as  that  act  was  over,  left  Oxford,  and  settled  upon  his  prebend 
at  Norwich. 

The  last  thing  he  did  at  Oxford,  was  to  attend  the  funeral 
of  his  friend  bishop  Fell,  who  died  on  the  Saturday  of  that 
act;  and  was  buried  on  the  Tuesday  following,  in  the  cathe- 
dral of  Christ-church,  underthe  dean's  stall  in  the  Latinchapel. 
As  soon  as  Dr.  Prideaux  had  seen  him  put  into  the  ground,  he 
immediately  left  Oxford,  and  never  afterward  returned 
thither.  This  good  bishop  was,  for  his  piety,  learning,  and 
wisdom,  esteemed  one  of  the  most  eminent  prelates  of  his 
time  ;  and  the  college,  which  long  enjoyed  the  benefit  of  his 
wise  and  useful  government,  is  so  much  indebted  to  him  on 
that  account,  as  well  as  for  his  buildings  and  other  benefac- 
tions, that  he  may  deservedly  be  esteemed  the  second  founder. 

Dr.  Prideaux  always  looked  on  him  as  the  author  of  the 
book,  called  The  Reasons  of  the  Decay  of  Christian  Piety, 
which  came  out  in  the  name  of  the  author  of  The  Whole  Duty 
of  Man;  and  his  reasons  for  it  were,  that  in  the  summer  of 
1676,  he  made  a  visit  to  Sir  William  Morice  at  Werrington, 
in  the  county  of  Devon,  (who  was  his  uncle,  having  married  a 
sister  of  his  father's)  when  among  other  discourse  that  passed 
between  them.  Sir  William  told  him,  he  thought  bishop  Fell 
was  the  author  of  that  book  ;  for  that  whilst  he  attended  at 
court,  as  secretary  of  state,  a  little  after  the  restoration,  he  heard 
the  bishop  preach  a  sermon  in  the  king's  chapel,  with  which 
he  was  -^o  much  pleased,  that  he  desired  to  have  a  copv  of  it. 


IHE    author's    LIFK.  li 

which  was  accordingly  presented  to  him ;  and  that  some 
years  after,  on  the  pubhcation  of  the  book  called  The  Decay 
of  Christian  Piety,  he  found  the  sermon  in  the  very  same 
words  in  that  book ;  and  thence  concluded,  that  the  person 
who  preached  the  one  must  be  the  author  of  the  other.  Dr. 
Prideaux  was  afterward  farther  confirmed  in  this  opinion ; 
for  as  he  attended  the  press  in  the  theatre  at  Oxford,  whilst 
another  of  the  books  ascribed  to  the  same  author  was  printing 
there,  he  often  found  whole  lines,  and  sometimes  two  or  three 
together  blotted  out,  and  interlineations  in  their  stead,  which 
he  knew  to  be  of  bishop  Fell's  handwriting  ;  and  this  was  a 
liberty,  which  it  was  unlikely  any  but  the  author  should  have 
taken.  So  that  his  opinion  upon  the  whole  was,  that  the  book, 
called  The  Whole  Duty  of  Man,  was  written  by  an  author  still 
unknown  ;  but  that  ail  the  other  books  assigned  to  the  same 
author  were  written  by  bishop  Fell  and  Dr.  Allestry.  And 
that  whereas  the  first  of  them,  that  was  printed,  either  by  de- 
sign or  mistake  of  the  bookseller,  came  forth  under  the  name 
of  the  author  of  The  Whole  Duty  of  Man,  they  suffered  all  the 
others  to  come  out  under  the  same  disguise,  the  better  to  con- 
ceal what  they  intended  should  be  a  secret.  And  as  to  what 
bishop  Fell  says  in  a  preface  to  a  folio  edition  printed  at 
Oxford,  in  which  all  these  books  are  comprised  together, 
where  he  mentions  the  author  as  lately  dead,  it  was  generally 
understood  to  be  meant  of  Dr.  Ailestry,  who  was  then  lately 
deceased. 

On  Dr.  Prideaus's  settling  at  Norwich,  the  whole  manage- 
ment of  the  afiairs  of  the  cathedral  fell  into  his  hands ;  and 
this  burden  remained  upon  him  ever  after  whilst  he  lived. 
On  his  first  undertaking  them,  he  found  all  matters  there  in 
the  utmost  disorder  and  confusion  ;  for  they  had  no  rentals, 
whereby  to  receive  their  rents,  nor  any  treasurer's  book, 
whereby  to  pay  the  salaries  of  the  officers  and  other  outgoings ; 
but  the  audit  book  of  the  former  year  was  the  only  guide, 
which  either  the  receiver  or  treasurer  had  for  what  was  to  be 
done  in  the  following  year ;  and  that  was  very  confused  and 
defective.  By  these  means  the  aifairs  of  the  church  being 
kept  in  an  intricate  and  dark  state,  the  seniors  often  imposed 
on  the  juniors.  In  order  io  remedy  these  inconveniences,  the 
doctor  was  at  the  pains  to  examine  all  the  leger  books,  and 
out  of  them  he  made  an  exact  rental  in  the  order  of  the  alpha- 
bet, which  being  every  year  writ  over  in  a  book,  the  recei- 
vers have  ever  since  continued  to  receive  the  rents  thereby- 
At  the  same  time  he  made  a  book  for  the  treasurer  in  a, due. 
and  orderly  method,  according  to  which  the  salaries  and  all 
other  payments  and  expenses  of  the  church  have  ever  since 
been  made  -,  and  by  the  help  of  those  two  books,  ho  reform- 


12  THE    AUTHOR  S    I.IFK. 

ed  the  audit  book,  supplying  what  was  defective  therein,  and 
puttin"  the  whole  in  a  proper  method  ;  and  these  his  regula- 
tions have  ever  since  been  followed  in  all  their  books  of 
accompts :  by  which  means  every  thing  is  made  plain  and 
easy.  He  examined  also  and  sorted  ail  their  charters  and 
evidences,  and  disposed  them  in  drawers  accordinj^  to  their 
proper  order,  by  which  means  they  may  easily  be  referred 
to  ;  whereas  before  this,  they  lay  in  a  very  confused  and  dis- 
orderly manner,  on  the  tloor  of  a  room,  which  was  unpaved 
and  covered  with  dirt,  and  the  windows  broken  ;  all  which  he 
repaired.  The  register  books  likewise,  and  other  books  that 
lay  neglected  and  dispersed  up  and  down,  he  had  bound  up 
in  order,  to  the  number  of  thirty  volumes  ;  so  that  all  the  evi- 
dences and  muniments  of  the  church  were  settled  and  dispo- 
sed of  in  perfect  order  and  method. 

The  tomb  of  Herbert  Losinga,  bishop  of  Norwich,  and 
founder  of  the  church,  having  been  demolished  in  the  civil 
wars,  the  doctor  caused  it  to  be  repaired,  and  put  a  new  in- 
scription on  it  of  his  own  composing  ;  giving  some  account  of 
the  founder,  and  of  this  and  his  other  foundations.  It  is 
placed  before  the  high  altar,  with  the  arms  of  tho  bishop  at 
ihe  upper  end,  the  dean's  on  the  lower,  and  the  six  prebenda- 
ties  on  the  sides.     This  was  done  in  the  year  1632. 

The  first  audit  the  doctor  was  at,  he  found  that  the  chap- 
ter were  always  at  a  loss  on  the  renewal  of  their  leases,  both 
as  to  the  value  of  their  estates,  the  fine  last  set,  and  other 
circumstances ;  and  that  they  were  obhged  to  refer  them- 
selves to  the  memory  of  the  seniors  for  information,  which 
was  very  imperfect  and  uncertain.  To  remedy  this  incon- 
venience therefore,  he  contrived  a  book  called  The  Private 
Register,  in  which  are  entered  the  time  of  every  renewal,  the 
name  of  the  tenant,  the  term  demised,  the  old  rent,  the 
provision  rent,  with  the  times  of  payment,  the  reservations, 
covenants  and  conditions  of  the  lease,  the  date  of  the  former 
lease,  the  real  value  of  the  estate,  what  was  taken  for  the  fine, 
and  on  what  consideration  it  was  either  raised  or  abated, 
with  all  those  other  circumstances  and  particulars  relating  to 
it,  which  might  be  of  use  to  be  known  at  future  renewals. 
This  book  begins  from  the  time  of  the  restoration,  though  it 
was  twenty  years  after,  that  he  set  about  composing  it.  As  to 
the  preceding  time  the  doctor  gathered  up  his  information  as 
well  as  he  could  from  the  leger  and  audit  books  of  the 
church,  and  from  the  memories  of  the  senior  members  of  the 
chapter ;  but  the  rest  he  formed  from  his  own  knowledge. 
This  book  he  kept,  continually  making  the  entries  with  his 
own  hand,  till  about  two  years  before  his  death  ;  when  he  di- 
rected it  to  be  done  hv  another. 


THE    author's   life.  13 

About  this  time  the  doctor  was  engaged  in  a  controversy 
with  the  papists  :  for  king  James,  upon  his  coming  to  the 
crown,  having  made  an  open  profession  of  their  religion,  they 
imagined,  that  supported  by  his  authority,  they  should  carry 
all  before  them,  and  bring  the  whole  nation  over  to  their  per- 
suasion ;  and  to  this  end,  sent  out  emissaries  into  all  parts  of 
the  kingdom.  Now  those  who  were  sent  into  the  country, 
they  would  not  trust  with  the  whole  controversy,  for  fear  of 
overburdening  their  abilities,  but  assigned  a  particular  point 
to  each,  which  he  was  to  insist  upon,  and  beyond  which  he 
was  not  to  meddle.  And  the  point  assigned  to  those,  who 
came  to  make  conversions  in  Norfolk  and  Norwich,  was  '  The 
Invalidity  of  the  Orders  of  the  Church  of  England,'  which 
they  were  directed  to  make  out  by  such  arguments  as  their 
superiors  had  furnished  them  with  ;  and  from  hence  they  were 
to  infer,  that  having  no  priesthood,  we  could  have  no  sacra- 
ments ;  and  consequently  could  be  no  church,  nor  any  salva- 
tion be  had  among  us.  The  first  who  appeared  there  with 
this  argument,  was  one  Webster,  who  had  formerly  been 
curate  of  St.  Margaret's,  in  King's  Lynn,  for  the  dean  and 
chapter  of  Norwich,  who  have  the  appropriation  of  that 
church,  and  being  turned  out  from  thence  for  his  notorious 
misdemeanours,  went  to  London,  and  there  kept  a  private 
school.  But  on  king  James's  coming  to  the  crown,  seeing  the 
great  encouragement  that  popery  met  with,  and  imagining  it 
would  turn  to  his  advantage,  he  early  embraced  that  interest, 
hoping  to  rise  by  it,  and  for  a  greater  show  of  zeal  came  into 
Norfolk,  as  a  missionarj  for  popery,  with  the  argument  above 
mentioned,  and  had  the  coniidence  to  send  a  challenge  to  the 
bishop  cf  Norwich,  appointing  a  cime  wru-ii  ne  would  co.ne 
to  him  at  his  palace,  and  dispute  that  point  v/ilh  him.  On 
this  the  bishop  desired  Dr.  Sharp  and  Dr.  Pridc^aux  to  be  pre- 
sent at  the  lime  appointed,  when  Webster  came,  bringing  with 
him  one  Mr.  Acton,  a  priest  of  the  order  of  the  Jesuits,  and 
who  resided  at  Norwich,  for  the  service  of  those  of  the  Roman 
communion  in  that  city.  When  all  were  seated,  Webster 
began  to  read  a  paper,  which  he  called  a  preface  to  the  dis- 
putation ;  whereupon  the  bishop  interrupting  him,  called  him 
to  an  account  for  his  apostacy,  and  reproved  him  for  that,  as 
well  as  for  the  present  insult,  in  the  manner  he  deserved ; 
upon  this  Webster  being  much  offended,  rose  up  in  great  an- 
ger, and  departing  abruptly,  broke  off  the  conference.  Both 
Dr.  Sharp  and  Dr.  Prideaux  offered  to  answer  his  arguments, 
if  he  would  have  proposed  them  ;  but  he  let  them  know,  that 
he  disdained  to  dispute  with  any  but  the  bishop  himself;  and 
so  the  conference  ended.  Not  long  after.  Mr.  Acton  having 
perverted  a  brewer  in  Norwich,  this  produced  a  dispute  on 


H  iHE  author's  life. 

the  same  point,  between  Mr.  Acton,  on  the  one  part,  and 
Mr.  Earbury  and  Mr.  Kipping,  two  Protestant  divines,  on  the 
other;  upon  which  a  gentleman  of  Norwich,  who  was  pre- 
sent at  the  conference,  pretended  not  to  have  received  satis- 
faction from  what  was  said  for  the  vahdity  of  our  orders, 
addressed  himseh'  in  a  letter  to  Dr.  Prideaux  about  it ;  to 
which  he  returned  an  answer  the  day  after,  November  II, 
1687.  Hence  followed  several  letters  on  both  sides  upon 
the  same  subject ;  and  the  last  the  doctor  wrote  on  this  occa- 
sion was  a  very  long  one,  containing  the  whole  state  of  the 
controversy.  But  by  the  time  he  had  finished  it,  understand- 
ing that  the  gentleman,  to  whom  it  was  intended  to  be  sent, 
was  gone  over  to  the  popish  communion,  and  irrecoverably 
determined  in  it,  the  doctor  did  not  think  it  worth  his  while 
to  get  a  copy  of  it  wrote  out  for  him,  or  concern  himself  any 
farther  about  him,  and  therefore  threw  aside  his  papers  in  his 
study,  as  no  farther  useful  to  the  end  they  were  originally 
intended.  In  the  beginning  of  April  following,  this  gentleman 
died,  owning  himself  a  member  of  that  communion,  upon 
which  the  papists  were  resolved  to  bury  him  in  the  cathedral 
church,  and  bring  him  thither  in  a  solemn  procession,  by  way 
of  triumph :  but  the  doctor  being  then  in  his  residence  at  the 
church,  was  as  fully  determined  to  obstruct  this  design,  and 
gave  orders,  that  no  grave  there  should  be  made  for  him 
This  being  matter  of  great  disappointment  to  them,  they  held 
a  meeting  at  the  goat  tavern  in  Norwich,  to  consult  about  it, 
and  from  thence  sent  a  message  to  the  doctor  to  expostulate 
with  him,  and  demand  his  reason  for  such  his  proceeding.  In 
answer  to  this,  he  wrote  them  a  letter  to  the  following  pur- 
port, that  Mr.  N ,   not  dying  within  the  precincts  of  the 

cathedral  church,  they  were  under  no  obligation  to  bury  him 
in  it:  but  he  recommended  it  to  his  relations  to  bury  him  as 
the  law  directed,  in  the  church  or  churchyard  of  the  parish  in 
which  he  died,  against  which  there  could  be  no  exception  :  and 
this  his  answer  the  doctor  chose  to  send  in  writing  with  his 
name  subscribed  to  it,  that  it  might  not  be  in  the  power  of  the 
messenger,  by  any  addition  or  alteration  of  his  own,  to  repre- 
sent it  otherwise  than  he  intended  it.  On  the  delivery  of 
this  note,  a  certain  knight,  who  lived  near  Norwich,  and  had 
several  times  turned  Papist  and  Protestant,  forwards  and  back- 
wards, as  either  religion  was  most  likely  to  be  uppermost, 
sitting  as  chairman  of  the  consultation,  declared,  that  there 
was  nothing  written  in  it  for  which  they  could  maVe  the  doc- 
tor suffer,  and  therefore  advised  them  to  send  to  him  again  in 
order  to  provoke  him  to  give  another  answer ;  and  accor- 
dingly the  brother  of  the  deceased,  who  had  also  gone  over 
ro  popery,  was  sent  on  this  CTand.  who  comin?  to  the  doctor'? 


IHt    author's    LliK.  15 

house  demanded  of  him  in  an  imperious  manner  why  he  would 
not  let  his  brother  be  buried  in  the  cathedral  ?  to  which  the 
doctor  answered,  that  he  had  sent  his  reasons  in  writing, 
which  he  supposed  the  other  had  seen.  His  reply  to  this 
was,  that  he  had  seen  the  writing,  but  that  the  reason  there 
given  was  not  sufficient,  and  he  would  have  another.  To  this 
the  doctor  said,  he  had  no  other  for  him  ;  and  so  leaving  him 
retired  to  his  study  ;  on  which  the  other  went  off  in  great 
wrath;  and  the  consult  not  being  able  to  gain  any  advantage 
against  the  doctor,  followed  his  advice,  and  buried  the  de- 
ceased in  the  church  of  the  parish  where  he  died. 

At  the  same  time  there  was  another  affair,  whichfurther 
exasperated  these  men  against  him  ;  for  the  doctor  observ- 
ing, that  the  clergy  of  Norwich  were  much  intimidated,  by 
the  severe  measures  the  king  took  for  the  propagating  of  his 
religion,  especially  after  what  had  happened  to  the  bishop 
of  London,  and  Dr.  Sharp,  dean  of  Norwich,  and  that  theV 
wholly  abstained  from  meddling  with  this  controversy,  at  a 
time  when  there  was  most  need  to  exert  themselves,  re- 
solved by  his  example  to  encourage  them  no  longer  to  be 
silent  on  so  important  an  occasion,  but  speak  out  in  defence 
of  the  holy  religion  they  professed.  Having  therefore  two 
turns  for  preachirig  in  the  cathedral,  the  first  on  Good-Fri- 
day, and  the  other  the  Sunday  seven-night  following,  he 
took  for  his  test,  the  24th,  25th,  26th,  27th,  and  28th  verses 
of  the  ixth  chapter  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  ;  the  word^ 
are  as  follow:  "  For  Christ  is  not  entered  into  the  holy 
places  made  with  hands,  Mhich  are  the  figures  of  the  true  : 
but  into  Heaven  itself,  now  to  appear  in  the  presence  of  God 
for  us, 

"Nor  yet  that  he  should  offer  himself  often,  as  the  high- 
priest  entereth  into  the  holy  place  every  year  with  the 
blood  of  others : 

"  For  then  must  he  often  have  suffered  since  the  foun- 
dation of  the  world  ;  but  now  once,  in  the  end  of  the  world, 
hath  he  appeared,  to  put  away  sin  by  the  sacrifice  of  himself. 

"  And  as  it  is  appointed  for  all  men  once  to  die,  but  after 
this  the  judgment ; 

"  So  Christ  was  once  oflered  to  bear  the  sins  of  many ;  and 
unto  them,  that  look  for  him,  shall  he  appear  the  second 
time  without  sin  unto  salvation." 

And  from  this  text  he  formed  both  his  sermons  against  the 
)nass-sacrifice  of  the  church  of  Rome,  endeavouring  to  prove. 
what  the  31st  article  of  our  church  says  of  them,  viz.  "  that 
the  sacrifices  of  masses,  in  which  it  was  commonly  said,  tha< 
the  priest  did  offer  Christ  for  the  quick  and  the  dead  to 
have  remission  of  pain  and  guilt,  were  blasphemous  fables 


16  TK£   AUTHOR'S  HFE. 

and  dangerous  deceits."  In  the  last  of  these  two  sermoDs 
he  had  these  words  :  "  And  now  I  doubt  not  but  that  there 
are  some,  who  will  not  be  a  little  offended  with  me,  for  what 
I  have  said  both  in  this,  and  my  former  discourse  on  this 
text;  but  unto  such  1  have  these  two  things  to  say  : — 

"First,  that  we  being  ministers  of  Jesus  Christ,  think  our- 
selves indispensably  obliged  by  the  law  of  our  mission,  and 
the  vow  we  have  entered  into  on  our  taking  this  holy  office 
upon  us,  to  declare  God's  truths  to  all  those  to  whom  we  are 
sent,  and  to  warn  them  of  those  errors,  which  if  they  fall  into, 
will  endanger  their  everlasting  salvation.  And  when  any 
party  of  men  are  so  unreasonable,  as  to  take  it  ill  at  our 
hands  for  discharging  our  duty  and  our  consciences  herein,  we 
shall  say  unto  them  the  same,  which  the  apostle  did  unto  the 
Jews  in  the  like  case,  Whether  it  be  right  inthe  sight  of  God 
to  hearken  to  you,  more  than  unto  God,  judge  ye. 

"  But  secondly,  as  God  and  our  consciences  oblige  us  to 
the  discharge  of  this  duty,  so  do  we  take  it,  that  we  have  full 
license  from  the  king's  most  excellent  majesty  to  authorize 
us  so  to  do ;  and  that  not  only  by  his  laws,  which  are  the 
most  authentic  expressions  of  his  will,  but  also  by  his  late 
declaration,  wherein,  out  of  his  abundant  clemency,  he  hath 
given  full  liberty  to  all  men  in  this  realm  to  own  and  profess 
each  their  own  religion,  according  as  their  consciences  shall 
direct. — And  seeing  by  virtue  of  this  liberty  so  many  now-a- 
days  do  take  it  upon  them  to  oppose  the  doctrines  of  out" 
church,  and  set  up  their  own  errors  against  them;  who  can 
with  any  reason  deny  us  the  benefit  of  this  same  liberty  to 
defend  ourselves  ;  for  since  so  many  make  use  of  the  privi- 
I-sge  of  this  liberty  now  granted  to  them,  not  only  to  preach 
up  their  erroneous  doctrines  against  us,  but  also  to  hu.it  after 
the  souls  of  men  from  house  to  house,  seekmg  whom  they 
can  devour;  without  permitting  those,  whom  they  think  they 
can  have  any  advantage  over,  either  to  live  in  quiet  or  die 
in  quiet,  in  our  communion;  if  we  only,  amidst  this  liberty, 
were  to  sit  still  with  our  hands  upon  our  mouths,  and  silently 
behold  those  to  be  daily  torn  from  us,  for  whose  souls  we  are 
to  answer,  if  they  perish  through  our  neglect,  our  case  would 
of  all  men  be  the  hardest.  It  can  never  enter  into  my  thoughts 
that  so  just  a  pnnce  as  our  present  mnjesty  is  owned  to  be, 
ever  designed  tc  put  any  such  thing  upon  us.  This  declara- 
tion is  general  to  all  his  people,  wiiich  is  demonstration  to 
me,  that  he  intended  the  benefit  of  it  for  all,  that  is,  as  well 
to  those  who  had  the  laws  on  their  side,  as  to  those  who  have 
not.  And  therefore  by  virtue  of  that  declaration,  as  well  as 
the  impulse  of  my  own  conscience,  I  have  thus  taken  it  upon 
me  to  discharge  my  duty  in  this  particular,  and  think  nothing 


THtl    AUTHOH'6  LlJb'E.  ■  17 

can  be  more  unreasonable,  tban  that  those,  wlio  have  no  right 
at  all  but  by  this  declaration,  should  take  any  exceptions  at  it. 
But  be  that  as  it  will,  since  God  hath  called  me  to  this  minis- 
try, I  am  not  ashamed  of,  neither  will  I  be  afraid  to  preach, 
the  gospel  of  Jesus  Christ." 

These  two  sermons  having  angered  the  papists,  Mr.  Acton, 
the  Jesuit,  who  was  chief  mass  priest  of  a  popish  conventicle, 
then  set  up  in  Norwich,  at  a  place  formerly  made  use  of  as  a 
granary,  sent  two  of  his  perverted  disciples  to  the  doctor,  to 
demand  an  account  of  the  said  sermons ;  to  which  he  answer- 
ed, that  he  knew  no  obligations  he  had  to  be  accountable  to 
the  men  of  the  granary  for  what  he  had  preached  in  the  cathe- 
dral :  if  they  had  a  mind  to  know  v/hat  he  delivered  there, 
they  might  come  and  hear  him,  and  that  was  all  the  answer 
he  would  give  them.  This  expression,  '  the  men  of  the  gra- 
nary,' gave  great  offence,  and  produced  a  very  angry  letter 
from  Mr.  Acton,  in  which  among  other  expressions  of  his  re- 
sentment, he  told  the  doctor,  "  that  it  was  expected  the  king, 
ere  long,  would  be  at  Norwich,  when  he  hoped  to  see  him 
upon  his  knees  in  theiroratory  ;  and  must  he  be  then  called 
one  of  the  men  of  the  granary  too  ?"  This  was  such  foolish 
stuff,  that  the  doctor  thoitght  it  proper,  from  thence,  to  des- 
pise the  man,  and  take  no  more  notice  of  him. 

All  these  particulars  of  the  doctor's  behaviour  having  made 
him  very  obnoxious  to  the  popish  party,  as  they  had  nothing 
else  to  object  to  him,  they  challenged  hin)  tor  not  answering 
a  letter  written  by  Mr.  Acton,  which  the  doctor  supposed 
could  be  none  but  the  last  he  received  from  Mr.  N. ;  for  be 
knew,  that  all  the  controversial  Jetteis  sent  to  him  in  his 
name,  were  written  by  flir.  Acton.  Upon  this,  he  gathered 
together  the  papers  he  had  formerly  written  in  that  contro- 
versy ;  and  in  order  to  let  those,  who  had  called  upon  him 
for  an  answer,  know  that  he  was  prepared  to  give  it,  sent 
them  to  the  press,  from  whence  they  were  published  in  the 
ensuing  summer,  under  the  title  of  The  Validlt>/  of  the  Or- 
ders of  the  Church  of  England,  made  out  against  the  objections 
of  the  Papists,  in  several  letters  to  a  gentleman  of  J^orwich, 
that  desired  satisfaction  therein. 

After  Dr.  Prideaux  had  preached  in  the  cathedral  the  two 
sermons  above  mentioned,  most  of  the  other  ministers  in 
Norwich  taking  courage  from  his  example,  preached  in  their 
respective  churches  against  the  errors  and  impiety  of  pope- 
ry. This  was  an  opposition,  those  of  that  sect  could  not 
bear  with  any  patience,  in  a  cause  which  now  they  reckon- 
ed as  their  own  ;  and  looking  upon  all  as  excited  by  the  doc- 
tor's example,  resolved  to  be  revenged  on  him,  for  this  and 
the  other  matter=,  in  which  he  had  oifended  Ihem  :  and  to  this 
V  or.  I.  3 


18  THE  AUTHOR  S  LIFE. 

end,  applied  to  a  popish  gentleman  of  considerable  figure  in 
Norfolk,  and  who  had  an  interest  in  king  James's  court,  to 
go  thither,  and  complain  of  him  to  the  king.  But  this  had 
no  etTect ;  for  as  they  had  a  design  there,  to  strike  at  the 
whole  body  of  the  Protestant  clergy,  it  was  no  longer  worth 
their  while,  to  concern  themselves  with  a  particular  person 
apart. 

And  this  design  was  laid  in  the  following  manner :  the  king 
had  about  a  year  before  published  his  declaration  of  indul- 
gence and  general  toleration  to  all  the  different  sects  of 
Christians  in  his  dominions,  that  all  might  worship  God  in 
their  own  way,  and  thereby  had  let  the  papists  into  the  pub- 
lic exercise  of  their  superstition  in  all  parts  of  the  kingdom. 
Now  that  he  might  farther  and  more  effectually  advance 
their  interest,  he  took  a  resolution,  and  accordingly  by  his 
own  authority,  ordered,  that  this  declaration  should  be  read 
bv  the  ministers,  in  all  the  churches  in  this  realm,  during  the 
time  of  the  celebration  of  divine  service,  with  an  intention  of 
ejecting  all  such,  as  should  refuse  to  comply  with  him  here- 
in, from  their  respective  churches,  and  supplying  the  va- 
cancies with  priests  of  the  church  of  Rome.  This  order 
bore  date  the  4th  of  May,  1G88,  and  enjoined  the  said  de- 
claration to  be  read  at  the  usual  time  of  divine  service,  on 
the  20th  and  27th  of  the  same  month,  in  all  churches  and 
ehapels  within  the  cities  of  London  and  Westminster,  and 
ten  miles  round  about,  and  upon  the  3d  and  10th  of  June 
following,  in  all  other  churches  and  chapels  throughout  the 
kingdom  ;  and  the  bishops  were  thereby  commanded  to  send 
and  distribute  the  said  declaration  through  their  several  and 
respective  dioceses,  to  be  read  accoi'dingly.  For  which  pur- 
pose, bundles  of  the  said  declaration  were  sent  from  the 
king''s  printing-house  to  every  bishop  in  the  kingdom,  accord- 
ing to  the  number  of  churches  and  chapels  in  their  respec- 
tive dioceses.  What  follov/ed  upon  this,  how  the  bishops 
petitioned  the  king,  were  imprisoned  for  the  cause,  and 
brought  to  their  trial,  are  all  particulars  so  well  known,  that 
they  need  not  be  here  mentioned. 

Two  or  three  of  the  l)ishops,  whose  inclinations  were  in  all 
things  to  comply  with  the  king's  measures,  and  had  been  pro- 
moted by  him  for  that  end,  scandalously  obeyed  his  order, 
and  sent  out  this  declaration  to  the  clergy  of  their  dioceses, 
to  be  read  by  them  in  their  churches  on  the  days  appointed; 
but  all  the  rest  refused,  and  thereb}'  screened  their  clergy 
from  the  blow  that  was  aimed  at  them. 

However,  that  they  might  not  be  surprised  by  having  this 
declaration  and  order  obtruded  upon  them  from  such  other 
hands  as  were  then  busily  employed  in  promoting  the  popish 


THE   AVTHOR-3    LIFE.  19 

cause,  a  letter  was  drawn  up  by  the  earl  of  Halifax,  directed 
to  all  the  clergy  of  England,  persuading  them  not  to  read 
the  declaration.  And  this  carried  with  it  such  strength  of 
reason,  as  convinced  every  one,  who  intended  to  adhere  to 
the  Protestant  religion,  rather  to  incur  the  king's  displeasure, 
than  obey  his  orders  in  this  matter.  This  letter  was  private- 
ly printed  and  carefully  dispersed  in  all  parts  of  the  king- 
dom, before  any  copies  of  it  were  given  out  in  London  ;  so 
that  it  had  every  where  its  eirect,  and  the  court  was  prevented 
from  any  opportunity  of  opposing  it. 

Dr.  William  Lloyd,  then  bishop  of  Norwich,  was  not 
wanting  on  this  occasion  to  exert  himself  to  the  utmost  for 
the  Protestant  cause.  Archbishop  Sancroft,  who  had  great 
confidence  in  his  wisdom  and  integrity,  sent  for  him,  as  soon 
as  the  order  came  out,  to  consult  together  with  the  other 
bishops  then  in  London,  what  was  properest  for  them  to  do 
in  this  critical  juncture  ;  and  that  his  letter  might  not  be  stop- 
ped at  the  post-office,  where  all  suspected  letters  were  every 
night  opened,  sent  his  servant  on  the  Norwich  road,  with 
orders  to  give  it  in  at  the  first  country  post-office  he  should 
meet  with,  to  be  sent  forwards  with  the  Norwich  bag.  But  it 
happened  by  the  neglect  of  the  post-master,  to  whom  it  was 
delivered,  that  it  did  not  reach  Norwich  till  a  post  after  it 
was  intended  ;  so  that  before  the  bishop  could  get  to  Lon- 
don, the  petition  of  the  seven  bishops  was  presented,  and  the 
petitioners  sent  to  the  tower.  However,  they  had  this  ad- 
vantage thereby,  that  his  lordship  being  at  liberty,  had  the 
opportunity  of  serving  them  as  their  solicitor,  and  conveying 
to  them  those  advices  of  the  nobility,  lawyers,  and  other 
friends,  by  which  they  governed  their  conduct  through  the 
whole  course  of  this  affair;  and  this  his  assiduity  was  so 
much  taken  notice  of,  that  he  was  more  than  once  threatened 
to  be  sent  to  keep  company  with  those  whose  cause  he  so 
diligently  solicited. 

The  letter  of  my  lord  Halifax  above  mentioned  being  just 
printed  olFbn  his  arrival  at  London,  he  got  two  thousand  of 
them  for  his  diocess,  and  sent  them  down  to  Dr.  Prideaux 
to  be  dispersed  among  the  clergy.  And  this  was  executed 
so  successfully,  that  before  the  third  of  June,  on  which  the 
declaration  was  to  be  read,  every  clergyman  in  the  diocess 
was  furnished  with  one  of  these  letters  against  it,  which  had  so 
good  an  effect,  that  out  of  one  thousand  two  hundred  parishes 
in  the  diocess  of  Norwich,  there  were  not  above  four  or  five 
in  which  it  was  read,  and  in  those  the  ministers  were  obliged 
to  read  it  out  of  the  Gazette. 

Dr.  Prideaux,  in  the  distribution  of  these  letters,  under- 
took a  dansjerous  task :  thev  were  conveved  down  to  him  in 


-0  'J  MK  Aurrion's  life. 

Ihc  ftagccoacb,  in  a  box,  under  the  care  of  an  old  gentleman 
in  the  neighbourhood,  whose  niece  the  doctor  had  married: 
and  as  soon  as  the  old  gentleman  was  come  home  to  his 
honse,  the  doctor  inimediately  went  thither  to  inquire  for  the 
box,  where  he  found  tlie  old  gentleman's  servant  opening  the 
box.  to  give  one  of  tliem  to  a  lewd  physician  of  Norwich,  who 
hail  gotten  into  his  acquaintance.  This  coming  of  the  doc- 
tor's was  very  fortunate,  and  prevented  the  whole  design 
from  being  betrayed  ;  for  had  the  box  been  opened,  and  but 
one  of  the  letters  been  delivered  out,  it  would  have  made 
the  atTair  too  hazardous  for  a  prudent  man  to  have  meddled 
any  farther  with  it.  The  physician  above  mentioned  was  a 
spy  for  the  papists,  and  in  all  respects  a  profligate  abandon- 
ed man;  and  the  doctor  not  knowing  how  far  the  secret 
might  have  been  communicated  to  him  by  the  old  gentleman, 
was  under  some  diilicully  how  to  proceed  any  farther;  for 
liaviiig  already  highly  provoked  the  popish  party,  should  he 
distribute  these  letters,  and  they  discover  that  it  was  his  do- 
ing, he  might  be  very  certain  (hey  would  do  their  utmost  to 
ruin  him.  However,  his  zeal  for  the  Protestant  religion  soon 
got  the  better  of  these  apprehensions:  determining  there- 
fore not  to  decline  any  danger,  where  the  interest  of  that 
cause  was  concerned,  he  undertook  this  affair,  and  had  the 
good  fortune  to  carry  it  through  without  being  discovered. 
And  this  was  chiefly  owing  to  a  contrivance  he  made  use  of 
in  the  management  of  it,  which  was  as  follows  :  having  made 
up  about  a  dozen  packets  with  several  of  these  letters  en- 
elosed  in  each  of  them,  he  superscribed  them  in  feigned 
hands,  to  as  many  ministers  in  the  city  of  Norwich  ;  and  sent 
a  person,  whom  he  knew  he  could  trust,  to  Yarmouth,  with 
directions  to  disperse  them  in  several  wherrie?,  which  came 
up  every  night  from  thence  to  Norwich  :  and  this  being  faith- 
fully executed,  the  letters  were  delivered  the  next  morning 
as  directed.  Now  as  they  were  sent  from  Yarmouth,  it  was 
generally  believed,  that  tliey  came  from  Holland;  and  the 
doctor,  by  this  device,  escaped  all  suspicion  of  having  any 
hand  in  the  affair.  As  to  the  rest,  he  sent  them  by  the  car- 
riers, who  go  from  Norwich  every  week,  into  all  parts  of  the 
country,  so  that  they  were  dispersed  over  the  diocess  with- 
out its  being  known  from  whose  hand  they  came,  till  all  the 
danger  was  over. 

At  this  time  there  was  one  of  the  prebendaries  of  Nor- 
wich strongly  inclined  to  popery,  and  prepared  to  give  in  to 
all  king  James's  measures  in  favour  of  it,  especially  in  pub- 
lishing the  above  mentionee  declaration  in  the  parish  church 
in  the  country,  of  which  he  was  minister.  But  the  two  days, 
©n  which  it  was  ordered  to  be  read,  being  the  3d  and  10th  of 


THE  author's  life.  2l 

June;  and  that  month  and  July  happening  to  be  the  two 
months  in  which  the  said  prebendary  was  to  keep  his  resi- 
dence at  the  cathedral,  he  sent  to  Dr.  Prideaux,  desiring  him 
to  excuse  his  coming  for  the  two  first  weeks  in  June,  and 
that  he  would  reside  for  him  those  two  weeks.  But  Dr.  Pri- 
deaux being  apprised  of  the  reasons  for  which  he  was  desirous 
of  being  excused  his  residence  those  two  weeks,  sent  him 
back  word,  that  he  would  by  no  means  comply  with  his  re- 
quest ;  that  the  3d  of  June,  being  Whitsunday,  and  the  10th 
of  the  same  month  Trinity  Sunday,  that  year,  the  service  of 
both  those  solemn  days  would  fail,  unless  he  came  to  attend 
it ;  and  that  the  consequence  of  such  failure  would  be  the 
forfeiture  of  the  revenue  of  bis  prebend  for  the  whole  year  ; 
and  as  Dr.  Prideaux  was  treasurer  of  the  church,  he  farther 
assured  him,  that  he  would  certainly  exact  it,  and  not  pa}  him 
one  penny.  This  message  immediately  brought  the  pre- 
bendary to  Norwich;  for  the  consideration  of  losing  his 
money  soon  got  the  better  of  his  zeal  for  popery  :  but  after- 
Tvard  he  complained  with  a  good  deal  of  regret  to  those  of 
the  same  persuasion,  that  he  was  not  allowed  the  opportunity^ 
of  showing  how  ready  he  was  to  comply  with  the  king  in  this 
particular.  This  same  man,  when  the  new  oaths  came  out, 
was  as  forward  to  swear  allegiance  to  king  William  and  queea 
Mary,  as  any  one  of  his  order. 

After  this  followed  the  trial  of  the  bishops,  in  which  the 
popish  party  were  worsted.  This,  however,  did  not  discou- 
rage them  from  pursuing  their  designs  against  the  parochial 
clergy.  Therefore  out  came  an  order  to  all  chancellors, 
commissaries,  and  archdeacons,  to  make  return  of  the  names 
of  such  of  the  parochial  clergy,  within  their  several  jurisdic- 
tions, as  did  not  read  the  above-mentioned  declaration  in  their 
respective  churches  on  the  day  appointed.  This,  in  the  be- 
ginning of  August,  brought  most  of  the  chancellors,  commis- 
saries, and  archdeacons  in  England,  to  London,  to  consult  to- 
gether what  answer  they  should  make  to  this  command  ;  but 
while  this  was  debating,  the  news  came  of  great  preparations 
making  in  Holland,  for  an  invasion  upon  England ;  and  this 
put  a  stop  to  all  further  proceedings. 

In  the  beginning  of  No\  ember  following,  the  prince  of 
Orange  landed  at  Torbay  in  Dev«  nshire,  and  soon  after  king 
James  abdicated  the  government,  and  withdrew  himself  be- 
yond sea;  upon  which  the  states  of  this  kingdom  having  met 
together  in  parliament,  to  consult  for  the  good  of  the  nation, 
after  many  solemn  debates  and  mature  deliberation,  it  was 
resolved,  that  our  deliverer,  the  prince  of  Orange,  with  his 
consortj  should  be  proclaimed  king  and  queen  of  these 
realm?,  which  was  done  accordingly.     Thus  were  we  happi- 


i22  THE  author's  life. 

ly  freed  from  the  fear  of  arbitrary  power,  and  the  galling 
chains  of  popish  superstition;  whilst  he  who  had  been  the 
tyrant  of  his  country,  fled  from  his  people  to  their  enemies, 
among  whom  he  spent  the  remainder  of  his  life,  the  dupe  of 
French  jjolitics,  the  tool  ot  designing  priests,  odious  to  his 
people,  and  justly  contemned  by  all  mankind. 

Every  thing  being  left  in  great  confusion  on  the  king's 
flight,  the  mob  rose  in  many  places,  aiid  created  great  disor- 
ders all  over  the  nation.  At  first,  they  began  with  rifling  the 
houses  of  papists,  and  such  as  were  reckoned  to  be  popishly 
affected;  till  at  last,  any  body  was  accounted  so,  in  whose 
house  plunder  was  to  be  had  ;  and  these  disorders  raged  no- 
where more  than  at  Norwich.  The  mob  there,  having  plun- 
dered several  houses  in  the  city,  at  last  made  an  appointment 
to  do  the  same  by  some  houses,  within  the  precinct  of  the 
cathedral,  which  they  had  marked  out  for  that  purpose. 
But  Dr.  Prideaux  having  timely  notice  of  their  design,  order- 
ed the  gates  of  the  close  to  be  shut  up  ;  and  the  inhabitants 
arming  themselves  for  their  defence,  repulsed  the  rabble, 
who  attacked  them,  to  the  number  of  five  hundred  men,  and 
made  them  desist  from  their  enterprise  :  upon  which  some- 
body crying  out,  '  to  the  bull,'  they  all  went  to  the  bull, 
which  was  a  tavern  kept  by  a  papist  in  the  city,  and  having 
plundered  and  gutted  this  house,  finished  their  expedition. 
The  next  night  every  body  following  the  doctor's  example, 
armed  themselves,  and  stood  upon  their  defence  all  over  the 
city,  and  this  soon  put  an  end  to  these  disorders. 

About  this  time.  Dr.  Battely,  having  resigned  his  archdea- 
conry of  Suffolk,  on  being  promoted  to  that  of  Canterbury; 
Dr.  Prideaux  was,  on  the  -21st  of  December,  1688,  collated 
to  it,  by  Dr.  William  Lloyd,  then  bishop  of  Norwich. 

On  the  13th  of  February,  1688-9,  the  prince  and  princess 
of  Orange  were  proclaimed  king  and  queen  of  England  : 
upon  which  it  was  thought  proper,  that  instead  of  the  former 
oaths  of  allegiance  and  supremacy,  two  new  oaths  should  be 
framed,  which  were  enjoined  to  be  taken  by  all  persons,  who 
were  in  any  office  or  place,  civil,  military,  or  ecclesiastical 
in  the  kingdom.  By  the  first  of  these,  allegiance  was  sworn 
to  the  new  king  and  queen ;  by  the  second  the  papal  and  all 
other  foreign  jurisdictions  are  renounced  ;  and  by  the  statute, 
which  enjoins  the  taking  these  oaths,  it  is  enacted,  not  only 
that  all  such  as  shall  from  that  time  be  preferred  to  any  ec- 
clesiastical dignity  or  benefice,  but  that  all  others,  then  in 
actual  possession  of  any  such,  should  take  the  said  oaths  be- 
fore the  1st  of  August  following,  on  the  penalty  of  suspen- 
sion for  six  months  following  ;  and  that  at  the  end  of  the  said 
sis  months,  if  they  still  persisted  not  to  take  the  said  oaths, 


THE    AUTHOR'S    LIFE.  23 

they  were  ipso  facto. to  be  deprived.  This  created  great  trou- 
ble and  disturbance  to  the  church  ;  for  archbishop  Sancroft 
and  six  others  of  the  bishops,  refusing  to  take  them,  as  thinking 
them  inconsistent  with  the  oaths  they  had  taken  to  king  James, 
fell  under  the  penalty  of  the  law,  were  first  suspended,  and 
afterward  deprived  ;  and  several  others  of  the  clergy  fol- 
lowing their  example,  were  in  like  manner  outed  of  their 
benefices:  and  these  being  for  the  most  part  men  of  con- 
science and  integrity,  the  church  suffered  a  great  loss,  in  being 
deprived  of  their  service.  iVJany  of  them  indeed  afterward 
indulged  themselves  in  such  a  humour  of  peevishness,  discon- 
tent, and  uncharitable  aversion  to  all  others  who  were  not 
of  the  same  opinion  with  themselves,  as  was  by  no  means  con- 
sistent with  a  true  Christian  temper  :  and  this  was  the  occa- 
sion of  a  schism,  that  is  not  yet  quite  ended.  Dr.  Prideaux, 
though  he  was  of  a  different  opinion  from  these  men  himself, 
and  thought  that  the  new  oaths  might  very  safely  be  taken, 
and  took  them  accordingly,  and  acted  up  to  them  faithfulJy 
all  the  rest  of  his  life  ;  yet  looking  upon  those  who  refused 
them  as  honest  men,  who  sacrificed  their  interests  to  their 
consciences,  always  treated  them  with  kindness  and  respect. 

In  the  May  following,  A.  D.  1689,  he  made  his  first  visita- 
tion of  his  archdeaconry  of  Suffolk;  and  the  new  oaths  and 
the  lawfulness  of  them  being  then  the  general  subject  of  debate, 
especially  among  the  clerg),  his  chief  business  in  this  visita- 
tion was,  to  give  the  best  satisfaction  he  could  to  those  who 
had  any  doubts  about  them  ;  in  which  he  had  such  success, 
that  though  there  were  not  above  three  hundred  parishes  in 
that  archdeaconry,  there  were  no  more  than  three  ministers 
in  all  that  jurisdiction,  who  stood  out,  and  refused  to  take 
them. 

On  the  1st  of  August  this  year,  all  who  refused  the  said 
oaths  being  suspended,  and  that  suspension  followed  with 
deprivation  of  such  as  persisted  in  their  refusal  on  the  1st 
of  February  following  ;  the  diocess  of  Norwich  lost  their 
worthy  bishop,  Dr.  William  Lloyd,  who  not  being  satisfied  of 
the  lawfulness  of  the  said  oaths,  persisted  in  the  refusal  of 
them,  and  choosing  rather  to  sacrifice  his  interest  than  vio- 
late his  conscience,  was  by  virtue  of  the  statute  above  men- 
tioned deprived  of  his  bishoprick. 

The  winter  following,  A.  D.  1G80,  a  convocation  being 
called,  and  authorized  to  act  by  a  royal  commission.  Dr.  Pri- 
deaux attended  it  as  archdeacon  of  Suffolk.  The  business, 
which  they  were  called  to  was,  "  To  treat,  consult,  and 
agree,  of  and  upon  such  points,  matters,  and  things,  as 
should  be  proposed  to  them,  concerning  alterations  and 
amendments  of  the  liturgy,  and  canons,  and  ordinances,  and 


24  THE  author's  life: 

constitutions,  for  the  reformation  of  ecclesiastical  courts,  for 
the  removal  of  scandalous  ministers,  for  the  reformation  of 
manners,  either  in  ministers  or  people,  and  for  the  examina- 
tion of  such  persons  as  deserve  to  be  adntitted  into  holy 
orders ;  and  all  other  points,  causes,  and  matters,  as  should 
be  thought  necessar}  and  expedient  for  advancing  the  ho- 
nour and  service  of  Almighty  God,  the  good  of  the  church, 
and  the  government  (hereof." 

Thus  WAS  the  intention  of  their  meeting  expressed  in  the 
commission  ;  and  in  order  to  prepare  matters,  which  vs^ere 
to  be  laid  before  them,  on  all  these  heads,  another  commis- 
sion was  granted  to  thirty  persons,  consisting  of  bishops, 
deans,  and  other  enunent  divines  of  the  church,  to  meet, 
consult,  form,  and  agree  upon,  all  particulars  to  this  pur- 
pose ;  who  having  met  accordingly,  agreed  on  such  altera- 
tions and  amendments  in  the  liturgy  as  were  thought  proper. 
And  these  were  what  were  first  to  have  been  proposed  to  the 
convocation,  to  be  by  them  settled  and  agreed  on ;  but  the 
majority  of  the  lower  house  having  met  together,  with  reso- 
lutions fully  fixed  against  all  alterations  whatsoever,obstructed 
all  further  proceedings,  and  made  the  whole  design  miscarry. 

Those  who  were  for  the  alterations,  designed  Dr.  Tillot- 
son,  then  dean  ol  St.  Paul's,  for  prolocutor  of  the  lower 
house  ;  and  the  court  were  desirous  he  should  be  the  person, 
hoping,  that  one  of  his  moderation  and  wisdom  in  the  chair 
would  be  able  to  influence  that  house,  to  concur  in  promo- 
ting those  ends,  for  which  the  convocation  was  called.  But 
all  this  was  defeated  by  setting  up  Dr.  Jane,  dean  of  Glou- 
cester, and  Regius  Professor  of  Divinity  in  Oxford,  to  be  his 
competitor,  who  carried  it  against  Dr.  Tillotson  by  a  great 
majority.  And  this  man,  as  soon  as  he  got  into  the  chair, 
opposing  every  thing  that  was  proposed  or  intended  by  the 
royal  commission,  was  the  principal  occasion  that  nothing 
succeeded. 

The  project  of  placing  him  there  was  first  laid,  and  after- 
ward carried  on,  by  the  intrigues  of  two  noble  lords,  who, 
on  account  of  their  near  relation  to  the  queen,  expected, 
w^hen  the  government  was,  at  the  revolution,  settled  on  king 
William  and  queen  IMary,  that  they  should  have  held  some 
of  the  higher  employments  under  it :  but  in  this  both  being 
disappointed,  grew  discontented,  and,  out  of  resentment,  en- 
deavoured all  they  could  to  perplex  and  embarrass  the  go- 
vernment, in  which  they  could  obtain  no  share,  and  among 
other  schemes  for  that  purpose,  set  themselves  to  baffle 
whatever  was  intended  by  this  convocation.  For  as  soon  as 
the  convocation  was  called,  and  those  who  had  wished  well 
to  it  had  expressed  their  desire  of  having  Dr.  Tillotson  for 


THE    AUTHOR  3    tlVE.  tZo 

prolocutor  ot"  the  lower  house,  these  two  noblemen  determi- 
ned to  set  up  a  competitor  against  him  ;  and  having  pitched 
on  the  dean  of  Gloucester,  went  to  Oxford  on  purpose  to 
work  him  to  their  designs.  There  they  found  him  as  much 
out  of  humour  as  themselves,  on  account  of  a  like  dis- 
appointment, and  very  ready  to  join  with  them  in  all  they 
proposed.  The  reason  of  his  discontent  was,  it  seems, 
that  when  the  prince  of  Orange  was  at  Hungerford  in 
his  march  towards  London,  the  doctor  with  three  others 
were  sent  from  the  University  of  Oxford,  to  make  him  an 
offer  of  their  plate,  which,  though  the  prince  handsomely 
refused,  the  doctor  thought  he  had  merited  whatever  he 
should  think  proper  to  ask,  and  accordingly  asked  the  bishop- 
ric of  Exeter,  which  was  void  by  the  removal  of  bishop 
Lamplugh  to  the  archbishopric  of  York  ;  and  not  succeed- 
ing according  to  his  desire  (for  it  had  before  been  promised 
to  Dr.  Trelawney,  bishop  of  Bristol)  this  so  far  disgusted 
him,  that  he  was  ever  after  a  professed  enemy  to  king  Wil- 
liam and  his  government,  of  which  his  conduct  in  this  affair 
was  a  very  strong  instance. 

On  the  opening  of  the  convocation,  which  was  held  ia 
king  Henry  the  Seventh's  chapel,  the  earl  of  Nottingham  ha- 
ving brought  thither  the  king's  commission  for  their  acting, 
and  with  it  a  gracious  message  from  his  majesty  concerning 
the  same,  the  first  thing  that  came  under  their  considera- 
tion, was  to  return  an  address  of  thanks  to  his  majesty  for 
both  ;  and  to  this  purpose  a  form  was  drawn  up  in  the  upper 
house,  and  sent  down  to  the  lower,  for  their  approbation. 
This  form  being  rejected  here,  a  proposal  was  otfered,  that 
they  should  address  separately,  in  a  form  of  their  own.  This 
too,  upon  being  canvassed,  was  laid  aside,  as  improper  and 
unprecedented.  At  last  therefore  the  lower  house  set 
themselves  to  mend  the  form  that  had  been  sent  them  ;  and 
after  many  debates  and  conferences  had  about  this  atTair, 
which  lasted  for  several  days  together,  a  form  was  agreed 
on  by  all  parties ;  and  the  address  presented  to  liis  majesty 
at  Whitehall  the  12th  of  December.  By  this  time  it  was 
clearly  seen,  that  much  the  greater  part  of  the  lower  house 
was  determined  against  making  any  alterations  or  amend- 
ments in  the  liturgy,  which  was  the  matter  next  to  be  pro- 
posed to  them  :  they  were  therefore  on  the  13th  adjourned 
to  the  24th  of  January  following;  and  so  ended  this  con- 
vocation, after  having  sate  about  ten  days,  without  advan- 
cing one  step  in  the  business  for  which  they  were  called. 

The  last  thing  attempted  in  the  lower  house  was  to  fix 
tJieir  censure  on  such  books  as  had  been  published  at  their 
first  meeting,   concerning  affairs  that    were   to  come  before 

Vor,.  f.  -1 


2b  THE    AUXHOH  S    LIJTE* 

them  in  the  convocation  ;  for  some  of  those,  whose  opinions 
were  against  making  any  alterations  at  all,  having  published 
in  two  or  three  pamphlets  what  they  had  to  say  on  this  sub- 
ject ;  in  answer  to  these  came  out  several  of  the  other  side, 
one  of  which  was  written  by  Dr.  Prideaux,  and  bears  the  title 
of  yi  Letter  to  a  friend  relating  to  the  present  Convocation  at 
Westminster ^  which  met  with  so  great  approbation,  that 
several  thousands  of  it  were  sold  off  within  a  fortnight  after 
its  first  publication.  This  exasperated  the  other  party  a  good 
deal,  who  having  discovered  that  Dr.  Prideaux  was  the  au- 
thor, though  there  was  no  name  to  it,  would  willingly  have 
fallen  upon  him  with  their  censures.  On  the  other  side  it 
was  objected,  that  they  ought  to  begin  with  censuring  those 
pamphlets  which  were  first  published  ;  and  this  was  so  noto- 
riously just  and  reasonable  a  proposal,  that  it  could  not  be 
contradicted.  In  order  to  evade  it,  therefore,  they  were 
contented  to  drop  the  whole  affair ;  and  let  their  adversary, 
as  they  reckoned  him,  escape  unpunished,  rather  than  ex- 
pose their  friends  to  the  same  censure. 

Dr.  Prideaux,  who  had  great  expectations  from  this  convo- 
cation, hoping  that  many  things  would  have  been  done  for  the 
advantage  of  the  church,  especially  in  improving  and  amend- 
ing the  liturgy,  was  much  grieved  at  their  ill  success.  For 
it  is  the  opinion  of  many,  that  there  are  some  defects  in  our 
present  liturgy,  such  as  that  there  are  whole  offices  wanting 
in  it,  as  for  the  receiving  of  penitents,  the  preparing  the 
condemned  for  their  deaths,  the  consecration  of  churches, 
&c.  And  that  some  of  those  otiices,  which  are  established, 
do  not  in  all  particulars  answer  the  occasions  for  which  they 
were  appointed,  as  may  be  instanced  in  the  office  of  the  visi- 
tation of  the  sick  ;  in  which  it  is  objected,  that  there  are 
some  particulars,  which  cannot  always  with  propriety  be 
said.  In  the  oflice  for  the  burial  of  the  dead,  we  express  our 
hopes  of  the  salvation  of  all  that  are  buried,  though  they 
may  be  atheists  and  deists,  and  such  as  have  declared  them- 
selves so  to  the  last.  In  the  litany,  we  pray  for  the  strength- 
ening of  the  king  in  the  true  worship  of  God  ;  whereas  it  may 
happen,  that  the  king  is  openly  and  declaredly  in  a  false 
worship,  as  was  the  case  of  king  James  the  Second.  In  the 
prayer  for  the  parliament,  the  king  who  reigneth  over  us, 
whoever  he  be,  is  styled  our  most  religious  king;  whereas  it 
may  happen  that  we  may  have  a  king  who  hath  no  religion 
at  all,  as  some  say  was  the  case  of  king  Charles  the  Second. 
And  besides  these,  there  are  many  other  particulars  in  differ- 
ent parts  of  the  service  that  are  objected  against,  especially 
by  those  that  dissent  from  us,  which  Dr.  Prideaux  was  of 
opinion  nnight  be  much -easier  corrected  than  defended.     And 


THE    AUTHOR'S    LIFE.  27 

were  all  those  places  in  our  liturgy,  which  are  with  any  jus- 
tice excepted  against,  corrected  and  amended,  and  what  was 
wanting  therein  supplied,  as  many  hoped  would  have  been 
done  by  this  convocation  ;  it  is  hardly  to  be  doubted,  but 
that  all  our  offices  might  have  been  rendered  so  complete, 
perfect,  and  unexceptionable,  that  not  only  many  of  the  dis- 
senters among  us,  but  also  foreign  churches  of  the  Protes- 
tant communion,  might  have  been  persuaded  to  introduce 
them  into  their  public  religious  assemblies,  and  unite  in  the 
same  form  of  worship,  as  well  as  in  the  same  faith  with  us. 

Dr.  Prideaux,  on  his  return  from  the  convocation,  finding 
the  cathedral  church  fully  settled  under  the  new  dean,  who, 
as  he  had  no  other  avocation,  constantly  resided  there  ;  and 
the  popish  controversy  being  brought  to  an  end  by  the  revo- 
lution, he  quitted  Norwich,  and  retired  to  his  parsonage  of 
Saham,  in  the  county  of  Norfolk,  which  he  served  constantly 
every  Sunday,  morning  and  afternoon,  during  the  four  years 
that  he  lived  there,  excepting  only  while  he  was  keeping  his 
two  months    residence  at  Norwich,  or  visiting  his  archdea- 
conry of  Suffolk,  which  he  did  constantly  twice  every  year, 
until  disabled  to  bear  the  journey  by  the    unhappy  disorder 
that   afterward  came  upon  him.     For  the  tirst  three  years 
after   the   revolution,    he  took   upon  himself  the   office  of 
preaching  at  every  place  where  he  held  his  visitation,  which 
was  a  caution  then  very  necessary,  for  preventing  such  of 
the  clergy,  as  were  not  satisfied  of  the  justice  of  the  revolu- 
tion, from  launching  out  on  topics  that  might  give  offence 
to  the  government,  when  it  should  come  to  their  turn  to 
preach.     In  all  the  sermons  he   preached  on  this   occasion, 
he,  with  great  earnestness,  pressed  upon  the  clergy  the  faith- 
ful discharge  of  the  duties  of  their  function  ;  that   so   they 
might  to  the  utmost  of  their  power,  both  by  the  good  exam- 
ples of  their  lives,  and  the  soundness  of  their  doctrines,  pro- 
mote the  honour  of  God,  and  the  salvation  of  souls  among  the 
people   to  whom  they  were  sent ;  and  being  well   informed, 
that  in  many  families  of  the    clergy,   prayers  were   wholly 
omitted,  and  God  not  at  all  called  upon  either  morning  or 
evening;  in  one  of  his  visitations,  he  made  it  the  subject  of 
his  sermons  in  all  the  several  divisions  of  his  archdeaconry, 
to  urge  them  to  the  performance  of  this   duty.     When  the 
Jews  pray  thrice  every  day,  and  the  Mahometans  five  times, 
he  thought  it  a  shame  to  Christians,  especially  the  clergy,  not 
to  do  it  at  least  twice  every  day ;  prayer  being  one  of  the 
prime  duties,  which  by  the  nature  of  their  office  the  clergy 
are  designed  to ;  and  the  rubric  of  the  common-prayer  (to 
the  observance  of  which  they  have  all  subscribed)  obligeth 
every  one  of  them,  as  well  deacons  as  priests,  to  be  constant 


2i>  rnr.  atthor  ?  life. 

and  faitliful  hcrrin  :  for  the  words  of  the  rubric,  in  the  begin' 
niiig  of  the  Common-Prayrr  Book,  under  the  title,  Concern- 
ins:  '/""  Srrvire  of  llir  CJtvrrh,  are  as  follow  :  That  "  all 
priests  an<l  dcncons  arc  to  say  daily  the  morning  and  evening 
prayer,  either  privately  or  openly,  not  being  let  by  sickness, 
or  some  other  urgent  cause."  It  is  true,  the  words  imme- 
diately following  this  clause  in  the  rubric  direct  these  morn- 
ing and  evening  prayers  to  be  said  openly  by  the  minister, 
in  the  church  or  chapel  where  they  minister;  but  this  being 
impracticable  in  country  parishes,  by  reason  of  the  difficulty 
of  getting  the  people  together,  from  their  several  distant  ha- 
bitations ;  the  next  thing  that  is  practicable,  is  to  be  said  in  its 
stead,  and  that  is  family  prayer;  for  this  is  open  prayer  as 
well  as  the  other,  in  the  sense  of  the  rubric,  which  is  mani- 
fest, in  that  it  is  there  opposed  to  private  prayer.  Both, 
therefore,  are  included  in  the  obligation  of  this  rule  ;  so  that 
where  the  former  cannot  be  performed,  the  other  at  least 
must.  But  however  this  be,  as  it  is  the  duty  of  every  man, 
that  is  master  of  a  family,  to  take  care  that  God  be  daily 
worshipped  in  it,  more  especially  it  is  so,  if  he  be  of  the  cler- 
gy, who  are  all  consecrated,  and  set  apart  for  the  work  of 
prayer,  as  well  as  that  of  preaching  the  word  ;  and  therefore 
ought  by  their  example,  as  well  as  by  their  instruction  and 
exhortation,  to  excite  all  men  thereto;  and  consequently  are 
of  all  men  most  unpardonable,  if  themselves  neglect  this 
duty.  The  doctor  carried  this  matter  so  far,  as  to  tell  them, 
that  praver  was  so  much  the  duty  o(  tlie  clergy,  that  every 
one  of  the  order  should  not  only  be  diligent  and  constant  in 
daily  offering  of  it  up  unto  God,  every  morning  and  evening, 
with  his  whole  family,  but  that  in  whatever  other  family  he 
should  at  any  time  happen  to  lodge,  he  ought  to  offer  his 
prayers  to  the  family,  if  they  should  not  be  otherwise  provi- 
ded for  that  duty,  and  exhort  tliem  to  join  with  him  in  them  ; 
and  should  they  refuse  to  hearken  to  him  therein,  let  him 
look  on  that  house  as  unfit  for  a  clcrg}  man  to  make  his  abode 
in.  and  avoid  it  accordingly. 

The  bishopric  of  JSorwich  being  vacant  on  bishop  Lloyd's 
deprivation.  Dr.  Compton,  bishop  of  London,  and  Dr.  Lloyd, 
bishop  of  St.  Asaph,  were  appointed  by  commission  to  go- 
vern the  diocess.  till  a  successor  should  be  nominated  ;  and 
they  consulted  and  advi?ed  with  Dr.  Prideaux,  in  most 
things,  which  they  did  by  virtue  of  this  delegacy,  who  served 
them  on  all  occasions  much  to  their  satisfaction. 

The  cause  of  bishop  Lloyd's  deprivation  was  his  not  taking 
the  oaths  to  king  William  and  queen  IMary,  as  has  been 
mentioned  above  ;  for  on  his  first  refusal,  August  the  1st,  A. 
D.  1689,  he  was  with  several  others  of  the  clergy,  who  were 


THE    author's    life.  29 

of  the  same,  sentiments  with  him  as  to  this  matter,  suspended 
from  his  office,  and  on  his  persisting  in  the  same  refusal,  was 
on  the  1st  of  February  following  deprived  and  wholly  outed 
out  of  his  bishopric,  according  to  the  tenor  of  an  act  of  par- 
liament in  that  behalf  made  5  and  thereby  the  diocess  was 
deprived  of  a  very  able  and  worthy  pastor  ;  for  he  was  an  ex- 
cellent preacher,  a  man  of  great  integrity  and  piety,  tho- 
roughly understood  all  the  parts  and  duties  of  his  function, 
and  had  a  mind  fully  bent  to  put  them  all  in  execution,  for 
the  honour  of  God,  and  the  good  of  his  church  on  all  occa- 
sions. He  was  first  bishop  of  Llandaff,  from  thence  transla- 
ted to  Peterborough,  and  from  thence  by  another  translation, 
promoted  to  the  see  of  Norwich.  After  his  deprivation,  he 
lived  very  retired,  in  some  of  the  villages  near  London  ;  first 
at  Hoxton,  next  at  Wandsworth,  and  afterward  at  Hammer- 
smith ;  where  he  died  on  the  1st  of  January,  A.  D.  1709, 
being  full  twenty  years  after  he  had  been  deprived  of  his 
bishopric. 

Whilst  Dr.  Prideaux  lived  at  Saham,  he  contracted  a 
friendship  with  several  of  the  neighbouring  gentry,  particu- 
larly with  sir  John  Holland,  and  sir  Edward  Atkins.  The 
former  of  these  was  a  gentleman,  who  retained  a  remarkable 
vigour  in  a  very  advanced  age,  being  past  ninety,  when  the 
doctor  first  became  acquainted  with  him  ;  and  afterward  lived 
to  be  within  one  of  an  hundred.  He  was  a  person  of  great 
imderstanding  and  wisdom,  and  had  made  a  very  considerable 
figure  in  the  long  parliament,  where  he  was  always  for  mode- 
rate measures,  and  sided  with  those  who  were  for  composing 
matters  with  the  king;  till  at  last  finding  that  all  attempts  of 
this  kind  were  constantly  defeated  by  the  violence  of  par- 
ties, sometimes  on  the  side  of  the  parliament,  sometimes 
by  the  king,  and  that  there  were  no  hopes  of  bringing 
matters  to  an  accommodation,  he  began  to  despair  of 
being  any  longer  serviceable  to  his  king  or  his  country,  and 
therefore  retired  into  Holland,  where  he  lived  most  part  of 
bis  time,  till  the  return  of  king  Charles  the  Second,  when  he 
was  appointed  one  of  the  commissioners  sent  by  the  parlia- 
ment to  bring  him  home.  As  to  sir  Edward  Atkins,  he  lived 
much  nearer  the  doctor,  and  conversed  with  him  more  fre- 
quently. He  was  a  man  of  great  piety,  probity,  and  goodness, 
and  had  in  the  reign  of  king  James  the  Second,  been  Lord 
Chief  Baron  of  the  Exchequer,  and  acquitted  himself  in  that 
post  with  great  justice  and  integrity,  especially  towards  the 
clergy,  whom  he  would  never  suffer  to  be  oppressed,  and  of 
whose  rights  he  was  remarkably  careful,  whilst  he  presided 
in  that  court.  On  the  accession  of  king  William  and  queen 
Mary,  having  refused  to  take  the  oaths,  this  excluded  him 


oO  THE  AUTHOR'S  LIFE. 

from  all  place  under  the  government  in  that  reign,  on  which 
he  retired  to  Pickenham  in  Norfolk,  and  there  lived  quietly, 
greatly  respected  and  esteemed  by  all  his  neighbours,  to 
■whom  he  was  very  useful  in  reconciling  their  differences. 
For  being  a  man  of  great  reputation  and  integrity,  whenever 
any  controvei?)'  arose  among  them,  they  usually  referred  it 
to  his  arbitration,  which  he  alwavs  decided  with  justice  and 
equity,  and  generally  to  the  satisfaction  of  both  parties.  This 
was  his  chief  employment  and  delight  in  this  retirement, 
scarce  a  week  passing,  in  which  he  had  not  several  of  these 
causes  brought  before  him  ;  for  as  his  fame  spread  all  over 
the  country,  people  came  from  considerable  distances  to  lay 
their  causes  before  him.  As  to  the  oaths,  though  he  always  re- 
fused to  take  them  himself,  he  condemned  no  one  else  who  did. 
His  usual  saying  was,  when  he  was  discoursed  with  about  this 
matter,  that  the  devil  was  busy  with  men  on  their  death-beds  ; 
and  therefore  he  would  keep  his  mind  free,  that  when  he 
should  come  to  die,  he  might  have  no  doubts  or  fears  on  this 
account  to  disturb  his  conscience.  About  a  year  after  Dr. 
Prideaux  left  Saham,  Sir  Edward  also  left  Pickenham,  and  re- 
moved with  his  family  to  London,  where  he  not  long  after 
died  of  the  stone. 

In  the  beginning  of  the  year  IG89,  it  being  thought  proper 
to  fill  up  the  vacant  dioceses,  Dr.  Tillotson,  dean  of  St.  Paul's, 
was  declared  archbishop  ofCanterbury,  Dr.  Beveridge,  bishop 
of  Bath  and  Wells,  Dr.  Fowler,  bishop  of  Gloucester,  Dr. 
Cumberland,  bishop  of  Peterborough,  Dr.  Moor,  bishop  of 
Norwich,  Dr.  Patrick  was  translated  from  Chichester  to  Ely, 
and  Dr.  Grove  made  bishop  of  Chichester  in  his  place,  and  Dr. 
Ironside,  bishop  of  Bristol,  was  translated  to  Hereford,  and  Dr. 
Hall  was  nominated  to  the  bishopric  of  Bristol  in  his  stead. 
But  Dr.  Beveridge  having  refused  to  take  the  bishopric  of 
Bath  and  Wells,  on  account  of  his  friendship  with  bishop 
Ken,  who  had  been  deprived  of  the  same  for  not  taking  the 
oaths.  Dr.  Richard  Kidder,  dean  of  Peterborough,  and  one  of 
the  prebendaries  of  Norwich,  a  particular  friend  of  Dr.  Pri- 
deaux's,  was  appointed  bishop  of  that  diocess  in  his  stead. 
About  the  same  time.  Dr.  Lamplugh,  archbishop  of  York, 
dying,  Dr.  Sharp,  dean  ofCanterbury,  was  appointed  to  suc- 
ceed him.  And  all  these  being  settled  in  their  several  bish- 
oprics before  the  next  session  of  parliament,  took  their  seats 
there,  and  supplied  the  bench  of  bishops,  which,  till  then, 
had  been  very  thin  ever  since  the  revolution. 

While  the  filling  of  these  sees  was  under  deliberation,  the 
bishops  of  London  and  St.  Asaph  both  earnestly  recommend- 
ed Dr.  Prideaux  for  the  bishopric  of  Norv/ich,  without  his 
knowledo-e  or  desire.     For  had  their  recommendation  taken 


THE   AUTHOR  S    HfE.  31 

place,  and  the  doctor  thereon  been  named  to  that  bishopric, 
he  must  have  followed  Dr.  Beveridge's  example,  and  refused 
it  on  the  same  account  as  Dr.  Beveridee  did  ;  that  was,  be- 
cause of  his  great  friendship  with  bishop  Lloyd.  For  one  of 
the  last  things  that  good  bishop  did  in  his  diocess,  was  making 
Dr.  Prideaux  archdeacon  of  Suffolk  ;  and  should  the  doc- 
tor after  this,  liave  accepted  of  his  bishopric,  it  would  have 
sounded  ill  with  many,  and  carried  somewhat  like  the  appear- 
ance of  ingratitude  towards  his  benefactor;  not  but  that  the 
doctor  well  knew  there  would  have  been  no  justice  in  such  a 
censure  ;  for  if  bishop  Lloyd  could  not  with  a  safe  conscience 
bring  himself  under  these  oaths,  which  the  law  of  the  land 
prescribed  as  a  necessary  qualification  for  holding  his  bishop- 
ric, he  certainly  did  right  in  quitting  that,  rather  than  offer- 
ing any  violence  to  his  conscience  in  this  matter  :  but  there 
is  no  reason  why  the  church  of  that  diocess  should  remain 
without  a  pastor,  or  another,  who  did  not  labour  under  the 
same  scruples  with  bishop  Lloyd,  should  decline  the  accept- 
ance of  that  office,  for  which  the  other  was  by  law  disquali- 
fied, and  that  without  any  injury  or  injustice  to  him.  How- 
ever, Dr.  Prideaux  considered,  that  it  was  necessary,  espe- 
cially for  one  in  that  station,  to  avoid  all  appearance  of  evil. 
And  that  a  bishop  must  have  the  good  esteem  of  his  peo- 
ple, in  order  to  make  his  ministry  efficacious  among  them  ; 
that  this  esteem  was  as  much  diminished  by  actions  mistaken- 
ly reputed  evil,  as  by  those  which  are  truly  so;  and  in  short, 
that  a  bishop  should  be  as  Caesar  would  have  his  wife,  not  only 
clear  of  all  guilt,  but  free  from  the  imputation  of  it  likewise. 
In  the  first  session  of  parliament,  after  the  new  bishops  had 
taken  their  seats  there,  two  bills  were  brought  into  the  House 
of  Lords  relating  to  the  church,  in  both  of  which  Dr.  Pri- 
deaux happened  to  be  concerned.  The  first  was  to  take  away 
pluralities  of  benefices  with  cure  of  souls,  the  other  to  pre- 
vent clandestine  marriages :  that  which  was  for  taking  away 
pluralities  of  benefices  with  cure  of  souls,  was  chiefly  push- 
ed on  by  Dr.  Burnet,  bishop  of  Salisbury ;  and  before  any  thing 
on  this  subject  was  olFered  to  the  parliament,  that  zealous  and 
learned  bishop  communicated  the  design  with  a  draught  of  it 
to  Dr.  Prideaux,  and  asked  his  advice  upon  it.  The  doctor  in 
his  letter,  which  he  wrote  to  the  bishop  in  answer  to  this,  made 
three  objections  against  it.  First,  that  it  was  too  long;  for 
that  the  privilege  the  lords  have  of  qualifying  their  chaplains 
for  pluralities,  being  what  they  will  be  very  unwilling  to 
have  taken  away  or  lessened,  it  is  to  be  expected  that  the 
bill  will  meet  with  great  opposition  in  the  upper  house,  and 
every  word  of  it  will  be  there  scanned  and  canvassed,  in  order 
to  throw  it  out  5  and  therefore  the  more  words  there  are  in  it 


32  THE    author's    life. 

the  larger  scope  will  be  given  for  objections.  Secondly,  it 
takes  away  all  pluralities  without  exception  ;  whereas  there 
are  a  great  number  of  parishes  in  England  so  meanly  provi- 
ded with  maintenance  for  their  ministers,  that  unless  they  be 
allowed  to  be  served  by  some  of  the  neighouring  clerg},  they 
will  be  wholly  deserted  ;  and  therefore  it  is  necessary,  that 
for  such  cases  at  least,  exception  be  made,  and  pluralities  al- 
lowed of.  Thirdly,  it  seemed  to  out  those  of  their  pluralities, 
who  had  by  legal  dispensations  been  settled  in  them  before 
the  date  of  the  bill;  which  would  be  thought  a  great  hard- 
ship on  the  present  possessors,  who  have  purchased  those  dis- 
pensations,and  make  the  bill  to  pass  the  parliament  with  great- 
er difliculty.  His  advice  therefore  was,  that  the  bill,  without 
any  retrospect  to  what  was  thus  passed,  should  only  provide, 
that  all  pluralities  for  the  future  should  be  restrained  within  the 
limits  of  five  miles  distance,  measuring  it  by  the  common  road 
from  one  church  to  another;  and  that  all  this  be  expressed  ia 
as  short  a  bill  as  possible  :  and  such  a  bill  the  doctor  drew  up, 
at  his  lordship's  request,  and  sent  him,  with  a  short  treatise 
concerning  his  reasons  for  the  same.  This  bill  was  by  his 
lordship  otfered  to  the  archbishop,  who,  at  a  meeting  of  the 
bishops  at  Lambeth,  having  laid  it  before  them,  with  several 
other  draughts  prepared  for  the  same  purpose,  Dr.  Prideaux's 
bill  was  unanimously  approved  of,  and  chosen  by  them,  be- 
fore all  the  other  draughts  ;  and  it  was  then  agreed,  that  this 
should  be  the  bill  which  should  be  offered  to  the  parliament. 
But  the  lords,  as  Dr.  Prideaux  had  apprehended,  were  so 
fond  of  their  privilege  of  qualifying  chaplains  for  plu- 
ralities, that  they  would  hearken  to  nothing  which  should 
diminish  or  restrain  it ;  and  therefore  would  not  allow  the  bill 
so  much  as  to  be  once  read  in  their  house.  Dr.  Prideaux,  how- 
ever, in  hopes  that  the  good  of  the  church  might  at  some  time 
prevail  so  far,  as  to  have  this  considered  again  with  better 
success,  and  that  this  bill  and  treatise  mighl  then  prove  of 
some  use  for  regulating  this  matter,  caused  them  both  to  be 
printed  in  the  year  1710,  and  published  at  the  end  of  his 
book,  concerning  the  origin  and  right  of  tithes. 

As  to  the  other  bill  against  clandestine  marriages,  it  was 
brought  into  the  House  of  Lords  by  one  of  the  peers :  and 
the  purport  of  it  was,  to  make  it  felony  in  ministers  to 
solemnize  or  officiate  at  such  marriage.  Upon  this  a  long 
debate  arising,  Dr.  Kidder,  then  bishop  of  Bath  and  Wells, 
wrote  to  Dr.  Prideaux,  to  desire  his  opinion  about  it:  the 
doctor,  on  the  receipt  of  his  lordship's  letter,  which  came  to 
him  on  Monday,  wrote  an  answer,  and  sent  it  by  the  next 
post,  the  Wednesday  following.  It  contained  about  three 
sheets  of  paper,  in  which  he  shows,  that  the  original  law  for 


THE    AUTHORS    7.i  FK. 


presenting  clandestine  marriages,  ordains  tlwt  the  bans  of 
matrimony  shall  be  three  times  published  in  the  church  or 
chapel,  to  which  each  party  belongs,  before  any  marriage 
shall  be  solemnized  between  them.  Secondly,  that  this  law 
is  not  to  be  dispensed  with,  or  any  license  granted  thereon  to 
marry,  without  the  said  publication  of  bans,  but  to  persons 
of  good  state  and  quality.  Thirdly,  that  all  such  dispensa- 
tions and  licenses  be  granted  only  by  the  ecclesiastical  judge, 
who  hath  power  to  examine  upon  oath,  whether  the  said 
marriage  may  be  legally  celebrated  or  not.  Fourthly,  that 
the  judge,  on  his  examining  into  the  case,  must  have  it  vouch- 
ed to  him  by  the  oath  of  one  of  the  parties  at  least,  that  there 
is  no  let,  impediment,  or  precontract,  consanguinity,  affi- 
nity, or  any  other  cause  whatsoever,  nor  any  suit  commenced 
in  any  ecclesiastical  court  to  bar  or  hinder  the  proceedings 
of  the  said  matrimony;  and  he  must  farther  have  it  attested 
by  the  oaths  of  two  other  witnesses,  whereof  one  is  to  be 
known  to  the  judge,  that  the  party  to  be  married  (if  under 
age)  have  the  consent  of  parents,  or  guardians,  in  case  the 
parents  are  dead  :  and  when  he  is  satislied  of  all  this,  and 
hath  also  taken  security  for  the  same,  he  may  then,  and  not 
before,  decree  for  the  dispensation,  and  grant  license  accord- 
ingly, for  the  celebration  of  the  marriage,  without  publica- 
tion of  bans;  provided  he  direct  it  to  be  done  in  the  church 
or  chapel  to  which  both  or  one  of  the  parlies  belong,  and 
not  elsewhere.  And,  fifthly,  the  doctor  farther  showed  in  the 
said  letter,  that  in  case  all  these  rules  and  precautions  were 
duly  executed  and  observed,  it  is  scarce  possible  any  clan- 
destine marriage  should  ever  happen.  But  should  they  be 
all  observed,  not  one-third  part  of  the  licenses  now  made  sale 
of  would  be  granted  out,  which  would  very  considerably  di- 
minish the  income,  which  chancellors,  commissaries,  and  their 
registers  make  of  their  places  ;  and  therefore,  they  have,  by 
a  general  conspiracy,  all  England  over,  set  them  aside  for 
the  sake  of  promoting  their  own  unjust  lucre.  For  now,  in- 
stead of  observing  the  rules,  and  taking  the  precautions  and 
securities  above  mentioned,  in  granting  matrimonial  licenses, 
chancellors  and  commissaries  seal  them  up  in  heaps,  leaving 
blanks  to  be  filled  up  for  any  that  will  pay  for  them  ;  and 
thus  send  them  to  market  all  over  their  jurisdiction,  to  be  put 
off,  as  it  happens,  to  any  who  want  them,  without  any  other 
examination  than  of  the  purse  of  the  purchaser,  whether  he 
hath  money  enough  to  pay  the  fees.  Thus  it  comes  to  pass, 
Miat  abundance  of  ruinous  matches  are  constantly  contracted 
tmderthe  authority  of  these  illegal  licenses  ;  and  the  scandal 
of  all  falls  upon  the  church.  In  the  same  letter,  the  doctor 
takes  especial  notice  of  another  particular,  which   is.  that 


o  1  THK    AUTHOR  a    LIKK. 

Avhereastlie  canons  of  1603  do  more  than  once  enjoin,  that 
all  marriages  shall  be  celebrated  in  the  church  or  chapel,  to 
which  one  or  both  of  the  parties  belong,  lest  the  minister 
might  be  surprised  into  the  celebrating  of  an  illegal  or  un- 
litting  marriage,  by  his  not  knowing  the  parties;  they  take 
upon  themselves  the  liberty  of  acting  contrary  to  this  rule 
at  their  pleasure  ;  and  without  any  regard  to  the  canons 
which  prescribe  it,  direct  their  licenses  to  be  executed  in  any 
church  or  chapel  within  their  respective  jurisdictions,  which 
the  parties  or  either  of  them  shall  desire  ;  and  this  hath  given 
an  opportunity  to  the  bringing  about  most  of  the  stolen 
marriages  that  are  complained  of,  which,  had  this  rule  been 
duly  observed,  would  in  all  likelihood  have  been  prevented  ^, 
for  all  persons  being  usually  well  known  in  the  parishes  where 
they  live,  especially  to  the  minister,  the  fraud  of  such  a  mar- 
riage cannot  but  be  seen  and  discovered,  when  it  comes  to 
him  to  be  executed  ;  and  in  consequence,  if  he  be  not  a  very 
bad  man,  hindered  and  prevented  by  him.  On  the  other 
hand,  places,  where  the  parties  are  least  known,  are  the  pro- 
perest  for  acts  of  fraud  and  illegality  ;  and  such  they  will 
never  want,  as  long  as  chancellors  and  commissaries  take  the 
liberty  of  granting  the  licenses  above  mentioned,  and  there- 
by encourage  and  help  forward  the  iniquity  which  they  are 
in  duty  bound  to  prevent. 

Dr.  Prideaux's  advice  therefore  to  the  bishop  of  Bath  and 
Wells  was,  that  he  should  endeavour  to  prevail  with  his  grace 
the  archbishop  of  Canterbury,  and  the  rest  of  the  bishops,  to 
put  the  laws  in  execution,  which  are  already  made  against 
clandestine  marriages;  for  better  laws  cannot  be  contrived 
to  reform  this  abuse,  than  those  which  are  already  to  be 
found  in  our  ecclesiastical  constitutions  for  this  purpose  ;  and 
were  these  laws  duly  observed,  and  vigorously  prosecuted 
against  all  that  violated  them,  there  would  be  no  need  of  ma- 
king acts  of  parliament,  or  establishing  sanguinary  laws 
against  the  clergy  for  preventing  this  iniquity. 

As  to  the  bill  itself,  Dr.  Prideaux  in  his  letter  declared, 
that  should  it  pass  into  an  act,  it  would  be,  in  his  opinion, 
the  greatest  hardship  that  ever  was  put  upon  the  clergy  in 
any  Christian  state  ;  for  it  would  be  a  continual  snare  of  ruin 
and  destruction  to  them,  since  it  would  subject  them  to  be 
tried  for  their  lives  every  marriage  they  solemnized.  That 
it  would  not  be  a  sufficient  salvo  to  say  the  license  would  be 
their  security  ;  for  who  would  care  to  have  the  safety  of  his 
life  depend  on  a  slip  of  paper,  which  the  rats  might  eat  up, 
or  a  hundred  other  accidents  happen  to  destroy ;  and  then 
the  minister  must  suffer  death  for  want  of  it?  And  farther, 
for  his  part,  the  doctor  declared  to  the  bishop,  that  after  the 


THE    AUTHOR^S    LIFE.  oo 

passing  of  this  bill,  whatever  should  be  the  consequence,  he 
would  never  marry  any  more  persons ;  and  was  of  opinion, 
that  all  other  ministers,  who  had  any  regard  for  their  own 
safety,  would  take  the  same  resolution  ;  and  then  the  bill,  in- 
stead of  preventing  clandestine  marriages,  would  operate  so 
far  as  to  put  a  stop  to  all  marriages  whatsoever.  These 
considerations,  when  offered  to  the  house  in  the  debate,  were 
thought  to  carry  such  weight  with  them,  that  those  who 
brought  in  the  bill  were  content  to  drop  it,  and  pressed  it 
no  further.  The  bishop  of  Bath  and  Wells,  on  his  perusal 
of  this  letter,  forthwith  sent  it  to  the  press,  without  Dr.  Pri- 
deaux's  knowledge  or  consent ;  and  the  next  week  after,  to 
the  doctor's  great  surprise,  it  came  down  to  him  in  print. 
This  he  would  have  had  great  reason  to  be  offended  at,  had 
not  the  bishop  spared  him  so  far  as  not  to  put  his  name  to  it. 

In  the  same  year,  1691,  towards  the  end  of  the  long  vaca- 
tion, died  Dr.  Edward  Pocock,  the  eminent  Hebrew  Profes- 
sor at  Oxford,  in  the  eighty-eighth  year  of  his  age.  On  his 
death,  Dr.  Prideaux  was  offered  to  succeedjiim  in  his  profes- 
sor's place,  but  declined  it  for  several  reasons,  which  at  that 
time  made  it  inconvenient  to  him  to  accept  it,  but  afterward 
it  proved  much  to  his  detriment  that  he  did  not. 

About  Whitsunday,  A.D.  1692,  bishop  Moorfirst  came  into 
his  diocess,  and  Dr.  Prideaux  then  attended  him  as  one  of 
his  archdeacons  for  the  examining  of  candidates  who  offered 
themselves  to  be  ordained,  which  afforded  him  matter  of 
great  concern  ;  for  he  used  frequently  to  lament  the  exces- 
sive ignorance  he  had  met  with,  in  such  as  ofVered  themselves 
for  holy  orders,  at  their  examinations;  that  men,  who  were 
themselves  unacquainted  with  the  common  doctrines  of 
Christianity,  necessary  to  the  salvation  of  their  own  souls, 
should  take  upon  them  the  sacred  office  of  conducting  others 
to  salvation  :  and  this  he  attributed  in  a  great  measure  to  the 
neglect  of  family  devotion  ;  for  while  religion  remained  in 
families,  and  God  was  daily  worshipped,  children  were  early 
bred  up  by  their  parents,  and  instructed  in  the  knowledge  of 
Him  ;  and  the  principles  of  Christianity,  thus  first  instilled 
into  them,  cotitinued  to  grow  up  with  them  into  further 
knowledge,  as  themselves  grew  to  be  furtlier  capable  of  it. 
And  whilst  young  men  were  thus  educated,  when  any  of  them 
were  sent  to  the  university,  there  to  be  fitted  by  their  studies 
for  the  ministry  of  religion,  they  carried  some  knowledge  of 
it  thither  with  them,  and  thereby  became  the  sooner  and 
more  effectually  qualified  to  become  teachers  of  it.  But 
since  family  devotion  and  family  instruction,  through  the 
causes  already  mentioned,  have  been  neglected,  and  thi.» 
neglect  through  the  corruption  oi'  the  times   has  grown  so 


S6  THF,    AUTH0R*!3    LIFE. 

i'iist,  as  now  in  a  great  measure  to  have  overspread  the  lanJ, 
yonng  men  fiocniently  come  to  the  university  without  any 
knowledge  or  tincture  of  religion  at  all;  and  having  little 
opportunity  of  improving  themselves  therein,  whilst  under- 
graduates, because  the  course  of  their  studies  inclines  them 
to  philosophy  and  other  kinds  of  learning;  they  are  usually 
admitted  to  their  fust  degree  of  bachelor  of  arts,  with  the 
same  ignorance  as  to  all  sacred  learning,  as  when  first  ad- 
mitted into  the  universities;  and  many  of  them  as  soon  as 
they  have  taken  that  degree,  oU'ering  themselves  for  orders, 
are  too  often  admitted  to  he  teachers  in  the  church,  when 
they  are  only  fit  to  be  catechumens  therein.  These  consi- 
derations made  the  doctor  often  lament  the  loss  of  Dr.  Bus- 
by's benefaction,  who  offered  to  found  two  catechistical  lec- 
tures, one  in  each  university,  with  an  endowment  of  100/. 
per  annum  each,  for  instructing  the  under-graduates  in  the 
rudiments  of  the  Christian  religion  ;  provided  all  the  said 
under-graduates  should  be  obliged  to  attend  those  lectures, 
and  none  of  them  be  admitted  to  the  degree  of  bachelor  of 
arts,  till  after  having  been  examined  by  the  catechist,  as  to 
their  knowledge  in  the  doctrines  and  precepts  of  the  Chris- 
tian religion,  and  by  him  approved  of.  But  this  condition 
being  rejected  by  both  universities,  the  benefaction  was  re- 
jected therewith,  and  the  church  hath  ever  since  suffered 
tor  the  want  of  it.  He  used  likewise  to  complain  of  another 
abuse,  which  he  frequently  met  with  at  ordinations;  that  is, 
false  testimonials;  for  how  defective  soever  any  of  the  can- 
didates may  be  in  their  learning,  and  how  faulty  and  scanda- 
lous soever  in  tlicir  manners,  they  never  want  ample  testi- 
monials, with  the  full  number  of  neighbouring  ministers' hands 
thereto,  vouching  the  contrary.  By  this  means  bishops  are 
often  so  deceived,  as  to  admit  into  orders  such  as  are  noto- 
riously unworthy  of  them.  This  the  doctor  thought  was  a 
scandalous  abuse  in  those  ministers,  who  misguided  and  im- 
posed on  bishops  by  such  false  testimonials  ;  for  the  reme- 
dying of  which  it  would  be  proper,  that  any  minister,  who 
should  thus  endeavour  by  unjustifiable  means  to  pro- 
cure orders  for  an  undeserving  person,  should  himself  be 
suspended  from  his  own,  till  he  was  made  sensible  of  his 
error  ;  and  ever  after  stand  unqualified  for  giving  any  more 
testimony  in  the  like  cases. 

After  the  act  of  toleration  had  passed  the  royal  assent,  the 
first  of  king  William  and  queen  Mary,  many  people  foolishly 
imagined  that  they  had  thereby  full  liberty  given  them,  either 
to  go  to  church  or  stay  away,  and  idly  dispose  of  themselves 
elsewhere,  as  they  should  think  fit ;  and  accordingly,  the 
public  assem.blics  for  divine  worship  on  the  Lord's  day  were 


THE    AUTHOR  S    LIFE.  37 

much  deserted,  and  ale-houses  much  more  resorted  to  than 
the  churches.  Dr.  Prideaux,  in  order  to  put  a  stop  to  this 
growing  evil,  drew  up  a  circular  letter,  directed  to  the  minis- 
ters of  his  archdeaconry,  in  which,  after  he  had  informed 
them,  that  the  said  act  gave  no  toleration  to  absent  from 
church,  but  only  to  such,  who,  dissenting  from  the  estabhsh- 
ed  religion,  worshipped  God  elsewhere,  with  one  of  the  dis- 
senting sects  mentioned  in  the  said  act,  and  that  all  who  ab- 
sented themselves  from  church,  and  did  not  thus  worship 
God  elsewhere,  were  under  the  same  penalties  of  law  as  be- 
fore, and  ought  to  be  punished  accordingi)  ;  he  desired  them 
to  send  for  their  churchwardens,  and  having  fully  instructed 
them  in  this  matter,  exhort  them  to  do  their  duty  herein,  and 
present,  at  all  visitations  for  the  future,  ail  such  profane  and 
irreligious  absenters  from  church,  in  the  same  maimer  as  for- 
merly used  to  be  done  before  this  act  was  made.  This  circu- 
lar letter  he  sent  to  London,  and  having  there  gotten  as  many 
copies  of  it  to  be  printed  as  there  were  parishes  in  the 
archdeaconry  ;  on  his  next  visitation,  which  was  Michaelmas, 
A.  D.  1692,  dispersed  them  among  the  ministers  of  the  said 
parishes,  giving  each  of  them  one.  It  was  afterward  pub- 
lished at  the  end  of  his  Directions  to  Churchwardens ,  and  un- 
derwent several  editions.  This  letter,  he  found,  had,  in  some 
measure,  its  intended  effect,  though  it  could  not  wholly  cure 
this  evil. 

On  Michaelmas,  1694,  he  thought  proper  to  leave  Saham, 
and  return  again  with  his  family  to  Norwich,  after  he  had  re- 
sided there  about  four  years.  His  reasons  for  leaving  this 
place  were,  that  the  country  thereabouts  subjecting  people 
to  agues,  his  family  were  hardly  ever  free  from  that  distem- 
per all  the  time  he  lived  there.  He  was  himself  sick  of  it 
a  considerable  time  ;  and  two  of  his  children  were  so  long 
ill,  and  contracted  so  bad  a  state  of  health  from  it,  as  after- 
ward cost  them  both  their  lives.  Besides,  being  obliged  to 
leave  most  of  his  books  at  Norwich,  as  not  having  room  for 
them  in  his  house  at  Saham,  this  hindered  him  from  carrying 
on  his  studies  according  to  his  inclinations  ;  and  in  these  he 
was  further  interrupted,  whilst  he  tarried  there,  by  the  avo- 
cations he  frequently  met  with  in  country  business,  which 
made  him  weary  of  the  place  ;  and  on  all  these  considera- 
tions, he  determined  to  leave  it.  On  his  quitting  Saham,  he 
gave  it  up  altogether,  without  reserving  to  himself  any  of  the 
profits,  as  he  might  have  done,  by  putting  a  curate  on  the 
parish  ;  and  resolving  that  as  far  as  in  him  lay,  the  benefice 
and  the  office  should  go  together,  he  resigned  both  into  the 
hands  of  the  bishop,  and  wrote  to  the  warden  and  fellows  of 
New-College,  in  Oxford,  who  were  patrons  of  the  living,  to 
present  another,  which  they  did  accordingly. 


53  THE  AUTHOR'S    LIFE. 

On  the  Doctor's  return  to  Norwich,  the  whole  business  of 
the  cathedral  fell  again  into  his  hands,  and  he  was  obliged  to 
undertake  the  burden  of  it,  to  prevent  all  from  running  to  con- 
fusion. The  dean  resided  mostly  at  London,  and  hardly  ever 
came  to  Norwich  till  towards  the  latter  end  of  his  time  ;  and 
Dr.  Prideaux,  after  he  had  left  Saham,  being  constantly 
there,  this  gave  him  a  full  opportunity  to  make  himself  master 
of  the  affairs  of  that  church;  which  he  continued  to  take 
care  of  till  the  time  of  his  death. 

On  the  12th  of  February,  A.  D.  1696,  he  was  instituted 
into  the  vicarage  of  Trowse,  on  the  presentation  of  the  dean 
and  chapter  of  Norwich.  It  is  a  little  village,  within  a  mile 
of  Norwich,  and  a  very  small  benefice,  being  hardly  worth  to 
him  more  than  40/.  per  annum.  However,  having  no  cure 
since  he  had  resigned  Saham,  he  took  this  small  vicarage, 
rather  for  the  sake  of  exercising  the  duties  of  his  function  in 
that  parish,  than  out  of  any  regard  to  the  small  profits  arising 
therefrom  :  for  though  his  prebendship  of  Norwich,  and  arch- 
deaconry of  Suffolk,  which  were  all  the  preferments  he  had 
at  this  time,  fell  very  much  short  of  a  sufficiency  to  support 
him,  yet,  as  he  had  private  fortunes  of  his  own,  he  needed 
not  so  small  an  accession  for  his  maintenance.  Having  ta- 
ken upon  himself  this  cure,  he  diligently  attended  it,  serving 
it  himself  every  Sunday  for  several  years  together,  till  he 
was  disabled  by  the  calamitous  distemper  of  the  stone,  from 
going  any  more  into  the  pulpit,  and  then  resigned  it ;  as  will 
be  hereafter  mentioned,  it  being  his  resolution  not  to  keep 
any  cure,  which  he  could  not  serve  himself. 

In  Easter  term,  1697,  he  published  his  life  of  Mahomet, 
which  was  so  well  received  in  the  world,  that  three  editions 
of  them  were  sold  off  the  first  year.  He  had  long  designed 
to  write  a  history  of  the  Saracen  Empire,  from  the  beginning 
of  it,  till  it  fell  into  pieces,  by  the  governors  of  provinces  set- 
ting up  each  for  themselves,  A.  D.  936,  which  was  three  hun- 
dred and  fourteen  years  from  its  first  rise  under  Mahomet. 
By  this  partition,  all  the  power  and  grandeur  of  it  had  an  end, 
though  its  name,  with  a  small  territory  round  Bagdat,  conti- 
nued under  the  succeeding  caliphs  some  ages  after.  This  his- 
tory, as  it  was  to  have  given  an  account  of  the  rise  and  pro- 
gress of  this  empire,  and  of  the  Mahometan  religion  with  it; 
f=o  was  it  likewise  to  have  comprehended  the  decay  and  fall 
of  the  Grecian  empire  in  the  east,  and  the  Christian  religion, 
which  sunk  with  it  in  those  parts;  for  the  power  of  the  one 
empire  being  built  on  the  decay  and  ruins  of  the  other,  their 
histories  are  necessarily  connected  and  interwoven  with  each 
other.  The  doctor  began  his  history  from  the  death  of 
Mauritius  the  Greek  emperor,  which  happened  A.  D.  602. 


THE  author's  life.  39 

and  had  gone  some  way  in  it,  before  he  went  to  Saham  ;  but 
not  being  able  to  go  on  with  it  there  for  want  of  his  books, 
which  he  had  left  behind  him  at  Norwich,  as  was  mentioned 
before,  the  work  stood  still  some  time.  However,  on  his 
return  to  Norwich,  he  resumed  it  again,  with  an  intention  of 
perfecting  it ;  but  whilst  he  was  thus  engaged  in  it,  some 
reasons  occurred  to  him,  which  made  him  desist  from  prose- 
cuting it  any  farther.  He  came  to  a  resolution  therefore  to 
publish  only  that  part  of  it,  which  contained  the  life  of  Ma- 
homet, and  drop  all  the  rest.  What  the  reasons  were  that 
induced  him  to  alter  his  design,  being  fully  shown  in  his  pre- 
face to  that  book,  there  is  no  need  of  repeating  them  here. 

The  doctor  found,  in  his  archidiaconal  visitations,  that  the 
churchwardens  of  his  archdeaconry  of  Suffolk,  as  in  all  other 
archdeaconries,  instead  of  presenting  what  was  amiss,  as  they 
are  bound  by  their  oaths,  at  those  visitations,  usually  gave  in 
their  presentments  as  if  all  was  right,  and  that  for  those  pa- 
rishes where  the  contrary  was  most  notorious.  This  afford- 
ed him,  as  it  must  every  honest  and  considerate  man,  matter 
of  melancholy  reflection,  that  three  or  four  hundred  men 
should  thus  deliberately  perjure  themselves  twice  a  year. 
In  order  therefore  to  put  a  stop  to  this  evil,  as  far  as  it  was 
in  his  power,  he  wrote  his  directions  to  churchwardens,  in- 
structing them  in  all  the  branches  of  their  duty,  which  they 
had  sworn  to  observe,  and  exhorting  and  directing  them 
faithfully  and  carefully  to  discharge  their  offices.  This  tract, 
as  it  was  written  for  the  use  of  his  archdeaconry,  he  imme- 
diately dispersed  through  all  the  parishes  of  it,  as  soon  as  it 
came  from  the  press.  The  first  edition  bore  date  December 
the  20th,  1707,and  since  that,  several  other  editions  have  been 
published:  the  third,  which  bore  date  in  September,  1712, 
is  the  completest ;  for  this  the  doctor  published,  after  having 
revised  the  two  former  editions,  and  made  man)  considera- 
ble additions  and  enlargements.  This,  therefore,  as  it  came 
from  the  author's  last  hand,  and  those  editions  which  have 
since  been  published  from  it,  I  should  choose  to  recommend 
to  such  as  have  occasion  for  the  book. 

In  December,  A.  D.  1701,  a  convocation  being  met  at 
London  for  transacting  the  affairs  of  the  church.  Dr.  Pri- 
deaux  went  thither,  and  took  his  seat  among  them  as  arch- 
deacon of  Suffolk.  On  his  arrival,  he  found  them  divided 
into  the  high-church  and  low-church  parties.  The  first  thing 
that  came  under  their  consideration,  was  the  choice  of  a 
prolocutor.  The  high-church  party  set  up  Dr.  Woodward, 
dean  of  Salisbury  ;  and  the  others  proposed  Dr.  Beveridge, 
archdeacon  of  Colchester.  The  former  carried  the  election 
by  a  great  majority,  and  took  the  chair  accordingly,  in  which 


40  THE  author's    life. 

he  conducted  himself  with  candour  and  abilities  much  be- 
yond what  was  expected  from  him.  And  now,  a  debate 
arose  concerning  the  privileges  of  the  lower  house,  where 
a  majority  of  the  members  claimed  to  be  on  the  same  foot- 
ing, as  to  the  upper  house,  that  the  Commons  in  Parliament 
are  in  regard  to  the  House  of  Lords  ;  that  is,  to  adjourn  by 
their  own  authority,  apart  from  the  upper  house,  when,  and 
to  such  time  as  they  should  think  fit.  This  the  upper  house, 
that  is,  the  bishops,  would  not  admit  of,  but  insisted  that  the 
ancient  usage,  which  had  been  all  along  continued,  was,  that 
the  president  adjourned  both  houses  together,  and  to  the 
same  time ;  and  that  this  was  signified  by  a  schedule  sent 
down  to  the  lower  house  ;  and  that  this  practice  they  would 
abide  by,  and  allow  of  no  other ;  and  so  far  Dr.  Prideaux 
concurred  with  them,  as  thinking  them  in  the  right.  But  as 
to  their  requiring,  that  the  lower  house  should  break  up,  as 
soon  as  the  schedule  come  down  to  them,  and  appoint 
no  committees  to  sit  and  act  on  the  intermediate  days, 
he  was  clearly  of  opinion,  that  in  both  these  particulars  they 
were  wholly  in  the  wrong ;  for  as  the  bishops  usually  break 
up  very  early,  to  attend  the  service  of  the  House  of  Lords  in 
Parliament,  and  then  send  down  the  schedule  of  adjourn- 
ment to  the  lower  house,  if  on  the  receipt  of  this  schedule 
the  lower  hduse  must  immediately  break  up  also,  what  time 
could  they  have  to  despatch  the  bussiness  before  them?  It 
seems  natural  from  the  reason  of  the  thing,  that  the  day  of 
sessions  be  allotted  for  the  business  of  it;  and  if  so,  what  lei- 
sure can  there  be,  unless  on  intermediate  days,  for  anj'  com- 
mittee to  sit  and  do  the  business  referred  to  them  ?  Two 
months  of  this  meeting  were  taken  up  in  arguing  and  deba- 
ting these  matters,  which  were  contested  with  a  great  deal 
of  heat  on  both  sides,  as  well  without  doors  (where  there  was 
abundance  of  pamphlets  printed  about  them)  as  within  the 
house.  At  length  the  lower  house  appointed  a  committee  to 
consider  of  some  method  for  accommodating  and  ending  this 
dispute,  that  so  they  might  be  able  to  proceed  in  the  other 
business  for  which  they  were  called.  Dr.  Prideaux  was  one 
of  this  committee,  who  sat  some  time;  but  before  any  re- 
port could  be  made,  the  prolocutor  fell  ill  and  died  :  upon 
which,  there  arose  a  new  debate  about  appointing  his  suc- 
cessor; but  this  did  not  last  long;  for  within  a  few  days  af- 
ter, on  the  8th  of  March,  1701,  king  William  died,  which  put 
an  end  to  the  convocation. 

On  the  10th  of  May  following,  A.  D.  1702,  died  Dr.  Hen- 
ry Fairfax,  dean  of  Norwich,  in  the  68th  year  of  his  age,  af- 
ter having  held  that  deanery  upwards  of  eleven  years  ;  and 
Dr.  Prideaux  being  appointed  to  succeed  him,  was  installed 
into  his  deanery  the  8th  of  June  following. 


THE  AUTHOR'S    Lll'E.  41 

As  soon  as  he  was  settled  herein,  he  set  himself  to  work, 
in  reforming  such  disorders  and  abuses  as  were  crept  into 
the  cathedral,  which  he  had  no  other  means  of  doing,  than 
by  purging  it  of  several  obnoxious  and  scandalous  persons 
who  were  the  occasion  of  those  disorders,  atid  filling  up  the 
vacancies  with  the  best  men  he  could  get.  This  he  did  ; 
and  by  admonishing  the  rest,  at  length  brought  the  whole 
choir  into  perfect  good  order;  and  so  it  continued  for  seve- 
ral years  to  the  time  of  his  death. 

The  3d  of  December,  A.  D.  1702,  being  appointed  a  pub- 
lic thanksgiving-day,  on  account  of  our  success  in  the  expe- 
dition against  Vigo,  in  Spain,  dean  Prideaux  preached  the 
thanksgiving  sermon,  at  the  cathedral  church  of  Norwich, 
and,  by  desire  of  the  mayor  and  aldermen  of  the  city,  had 
it  printed.  This  was  the  only  sermon  he  ever  published  ; 
and  had  he  followed  his  own  inclinations,  it  would  have  been 
one  of  the  last  of  all  he  had  preached  from  that  pulpit,  which 
he  had  chosen  for  that  purpose :  for,  according  to  the  gene- 
ral turn  of  such  sermons,  it  contained  little  more  than  an 
harangue  on  the  occasion  of  the  day.  However,  after  it 
had  been  once  published,  the  booksellers  thought  proper  to 
reprint  it,  at  the  end  of  his  Ecclesiastical  Tracts  printed  at 
London,  A.  D.  171G. 

In  Easter  term  following,  A.  D.  1 703,  he  published  a 
tract  in  vindication  of  the  present  established  law,  which 
gives  the  successor  in  any  ecclesiastical  benefice  or  promo- 
tion, all  the  profits  from  the  day  of  the  avoidance.  The  oc- 
casion of  his  writing  this  tract  was  as  follows :  As  the  law 
HOW  stands,  if  a  beneficed  clergyman  dies  a  little  before  har- 
vest, his  successor  shall  go  away  with  all  the  profits ;  and  by 
this  means,  often  leaves  the  family  of  his  predecessor  in  great 
poverty  and  distress  for  the  want  of  them.  This  was  by 
many  thought  a  very  hard  case,  and  several  of  the  clergy 
clamoured  hard  for  a  new  law  to  remedy  it;  which  induced 
some  of  the  bishops  to  thinkof  bringing  a  bill  into  parliament 
for  this  purpose ;  and  the  bishop  of  Salisbury,  Dr.  Burnet, 
being  particularly  zealous  in  this  matter,  undertook  to  draw 
the  bill.  Dr.  Prideaux  hearing  of  this,  set  himself  to  exa- 
mine into  the  case  ;  and  after  having  considered  it,  wrote  this 
tract  about  it;  in  which,  as  his  sentiments  happened  to  con- 
cur with  those  of  the  archbishop  of  Canterbury,  the  arch- 
bishop recommended  it  to  the  rest  of  the  bishops,  who,  on 
perusing  it,  were  so  far  convinced,  that  all  in  general  con- 
sented to  drop  it,  and  there  have  never  since  been  any 
thoughts  of  reviving  it.  This  piece  was  likewise  reprinted 
with  his  Ecclesiastical  Tracts. 

Fn  the  beginning  of  the   year  1705.  the  dean  had  a  very 

Vol.  I.  € 


'V2  THE    AL  THOU  S    IME. 

signal  deliverence  from  great  danger.  Dr.  Hayley,  late  dean 
of  Chichester,  being  then  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Norwich, 
dean  Prideaux  went  over  to  make  him  a  visit ;  and  while  he 
was  there,  the  servants  of  the  house  (without  the  knowledge 
or  privity  of  their  master)  made  his  coachman  so  drunk,  that, 
on  his  return,  he  fell  off  the  coach-box  ;  and  upon  his  falling, 
the  horses  immediately  took  fright,  and  ran  away  with  him 
near  three  miles  full  speed,  till  at  length  they  were  accidentally 
stopped  by  a  poor  labouring  man  returning  from  his  work : 
and  happily  the  dean  received  no  harm.  This  was  a  deliver- 
ance which  he  was  ever  after  very  thankful  to  God  for,  whilst 
he  lived.  And  there  were  two  circumstances,  which  seemed 
providentially  to  concur  in  saving  him  :  theiirst  was,  that  on 
his  return,  instead  of  driving  the  direct  road,  through  which  he 
went,  he  ordered  his  coachman  to  turn  to  the  right-hand  into 
another  road,  which  led  to  a  farther  part  of  the  city,  where 
some  business  called  him.  Now  this  road  being  smooth  and 
plain,  there  was  less  danger  from  an  accident  of  this  sort ; 
whereas  had  he  gone  the  other  road,  which  was  the  nearest 
■way  to  his  own  home,  there  was  a  steep  precipice  in  it  over 
which  the  horses  would  in  all  probability  have  fallen,  and 
beat  the  coach  in  pieces,  and  destroyed  him.  The  second  was, 
that  a  little  while  before  this  happened,  being  in  company 
with  some  of  his  friends,  the  case  of  bishop  Grove,  who  lost 
his  life  by  an  accident  of  the  like  kind,  was  talked  of;  and 
it  was  then  made  apparent  to  him  that  the  safest  way  in  such 
a  case  would  be  to  sit  still,  and  wait  the  event  of  an  over- 
throw, or  the  stopping  of  the  horses  by  some  other  means. 
And  had  he  not  been  thus  forewarned,  he  had  certainly  en- 
deavoured to  have  leaped  out  of  the  coach,  which,  in  all 
jirobability,  must  have  been  fatal  to  him ;  for  whilst  the  horses 
were  running  full  speed,  it  was  hardly  possible  for  him  to 
have  been  so  quick  in  getting  out,  but  the  hinder  wheel 
would  have  caught  him  in  the  attempt,  and  overrun  him  to 
his  destruction.  And  this  was  the  ruin  of  bishop  Grove, 
who,  whilst  the  horses  were  running  away  with  him,  endea- 
voured to  leap  out ;  but  the  hinder  wheel  of  the  coach  over- 
took him,  ran  over  him,  and  broke  his  leg,  of  which  he  died. 
Both  these  circumstances  the  dean  ever  after  looked  on  as 
instances  of  God's  mercy,  providentially  operating  to  his  de- 
liverance, and,  as  long  as  he  lived,  was  thankful  for  them. 

The  maintenance  of  the  parochial  clergy  of  Norwich, 
depending  mostly  upon  voluntary  contributions,  gathered 
from  door  to  door  in  every  parish,  in  the  year  1706,  it  was 
endeavoured  to  bring  it  to  a  certainty,  by  act  of  parliament ; 
and  in  order  to  this,  a  petition  from  the  city  being  necessary, 
the  mayor,  aldermen,  and  common-council,  were  solicited  to 


THE    author's   life,  13 

make  this  petition.  While  this  was  in  agitation,  for  the  far- 
thering the  success  of  so  good  a  design,  Dr.  Prideaux  pub- 
lished an  award  made  by  King  Charles  the  First,  and  passed 
under  his  broad  seal  for  the  settling  of  two  shillings  in  the 
pound,  out  of  the  rents  of  all  grounds,  buildings,  and  edifices, 
within  the  said  city  of  Norwich,  for  the  said  parochial  clergy, 
to  which  he  annexed  a  discourse  in  vindication  of  the  legality, 
justice,  and  reasonableness  of  that  award  ;  and  in  this  treat- 
ed particularly  of  the  nature  and  legality  of  personal  tithes, 
and  the  manner  of  paying  them  in  the  city  of  London  ;  and 
though  this  treatise  did  not  at  that  time  answer  the  end  for 
which  it  was  intended,  and  produce  the  desired  effect;  yet, 
as  he  was  in  hopes  it  might  some  time  or  other  be  of  use  for 
that  purpose,  he  had  it  reprinted  again  among  his  Ecclesias- 
tical Tracts,  A.  D.  1716. 

In  the  year  1707,  the  bishopric  of  Ely  falling  void  by 
the  death  of  bishop  Patrick,  Dr.  Moor,  bishop  of  Norwich, 
was  translated  thither  ;  and  Dr.  Charles  Trimnel,  one  of  the 
prebendaries  of  Norwich,  was  promoted  to  the  see  of  Nor- 
wich. From  the  translation  of  bishop  Moor  to  the  nam- 
ing his  successor,  near  half  a  year  intervened;  and  during 
this  time,  the  dean  had  many  letters  sent  him  by  his  friends, 
advising  and  encouraging  him  to  make  interest  for  the  bishop- 
ric :  but  this  he  could  by  no  means  be  persuaded  to  do, 
nor  did  he  think  it  consistent  with  his  interest  to  accept  of  it, 
in  case  it  had  been  offered  him  ;  for  he  was  then  near  sixty 
years  of  age  ;  and  as  the  revenues  of  his  deanery  and  arch- 
deaconry would  better  support  him  in  his  present  situation, 
than  those  of  the  bishopric  in  the  situation  of  a  bishop,  he 
thought  it  better  to  continue  as  he  was  ;  especially  as  the 
coming  into  that  bishopric  in  first-fruits,  fees,  providing  a 
suitable  equipage,  furnishing  his  house,  and  other  incidental 
expenses,  could  not  cost  him  less  than  2000/.  all  of  which  he 
must  save  again  out  of  the  bishopric,  or  his  family  suffer 
by  his  promotion.  There  have  been  frequent  instances  of 
bishops,  who  dying  too  soon  after  their  promotion,  have  left 
their  families  in  such  poverty,  as  to  want  charity  for  their  ne- 
cessary subsistence.  This  was  the  case  of  bishop  W — k,  and 
this  was  the  case  of  bishop  G — ve,  and  would  have  been  the 
case  of  archbishop  T — n,  had  not  his  widow  been  assisted 
after  his  death  by  a  pension  from  the  crown,  and  what  she 
got  of  the  booksellers  for  his  posthumous  sermons.  Dr.  Pri- 
deaux indeed  was  in  no  danger  of  leaving  his  family  in  such 
distress,  as  he  had  a  temporal  estate  sufficient  to  provide  for 
them  whenever  he  should  happen  to  die  ;  but  then  as  he  had 
got  nothing  by  the  church,  he  had  no  reason  to  hazard  his 
private  fortunes  (which  were  hi?  own.  and  his  wife's  inheri- 


4 4  thf;  ArTflon's  ljff. 

taucc)  in  the  service  of  it.  It  is  a  hard  case,  it  must  be 
owned,  on  the  clergy,  that  when  they  are  called  to  bishop- 
rics, they  should  be  so  eaten  out  with  the  payments  of  first- 
fruits  and  fees,  before  they  can  receive  any  benefit  from  their 
{)iefernient  :  and  it  were  much  to  be  wislied,  that  when  the 
parliament  discharged  all  small  livings  not  exceeding  50^. 
per  annum,  of  all  tenths  and  first-fruits,  they  had  also  dis- 
charged all  poor  bishoprics  of  the  same  payments,  that  is, 
all  not  exceeding  lOOO/.  per  annum,  considering  their  attend- 
ance at  parliament,  and  other  expenses  in  their  way  of  living, 
that  are  necessarily  annexed  to  their  office.  And  it  would  be 
much  easier,  if  instead  of  the  mock  elections  of  bishops  by 
Conge  (P  elire,  and  the  operose  way  of  suing  out  so  many  in- 
struments, and  going  through  so  many  ofiices,  and  their  pay- 
ing so  many  fees  for  them,  in  order  to  their  full  settlements 
in  their  preferments,  bishops  were  made  here  in  the  same 
manner  as  they  are  in  Ireland,  by  the  king's  letters  patent,  in 
which  case,  there  would  be  nothing  farther  necessary,  than 
those  letters  patent,  presenting  them  to  the  benefice,  as  in 
the  case  of  all  other  ecclesiastical  benefices  in  the  king's 
git't,  and  his  mandate  to  the  archbishop  to  consecrate,  insti- 
tute, and  install  them.  By  these  means,  a  great  deal  of 
trouble  and  expense  would  be  saved,  and  deans  and  chapters 
delivered  from  the  great  danger  of  a  PrcEmmiire,  which  they 
arc  liable  to  in  all  such  elections,  if  they  do  not  within  twenty 
days,  return  elected  the  person  whom  the  king,  in  his  letters 
missive,  nominates  to  them.  These  alterations  would  make 
such  promotions  much  more  desirable,  than  they  now  are,  to 
many  who  well  deserve  them.  But  that,  which  made  the 
dean  most  averse  to  pursuing  any  measures  for  obtaining  the 
bishopric,  and  weighed  most  with  him,  was,  that  he  was  very 
easy  in  his  deanery,  which  he  could  not  promise  himself  he 
should  be'in  a  bishopric.  In  the  former,  his  long  experience 
had  made  him  perfect  master  of  all  the  business  of  the  ca- 
thedral church,  which  he  comprehended  in  its  full  extent ; 
but  had  reason  to  fear,  he  should  not  be  able  to  do  the  same 
in  the  latter,  especially  since  now  attending  the  court  and  par- 
liament, and  atFairs  of  state,  are  made  so  much  the  business 
of  a  bishop,  which  he  knew  himself  to  be  wholly  unacquaint- 
ed with.  Instead  therefore  of  making  any  interest  for  him- 
self on  this  occasion,  he  engaged  all  that  he  had  for  Dr. 
Trimnell,  as  he  had  lived  a  long  while  in  friendship  with  him, 
and  knew  him  to  be  a  person  of  great  worth  and  goodness, 
and  every  way  deserving  the  preferment  he  then  aimed  at; 
which  the  diocess  of  Norwich  afterward  fully  experienced 
to  their  great  satisfaction. 

In  the  year  1709,  he  published  his  tract  Of  the  Oris^ina> 


THE  author's  life.  45 

Right  of  TUy.s.  His  design  at  first  was,  to  give  the  History 
of  Appropriations  ;  that  is,  to  show  by  what  means  they  be- 
gun, how  they  were  ahenated  into  lay-hands  at  the  reforma- 
tion, the  right  the  church  still  hath  to  them,  for  serving 
the  cure,  repairing  the  chancel,  and  bearing  all  other  eccle- 
siastical burdens,  the  right,  which  the  law  hath  now  given 
appropriators  in  them,  and  what  are  usurpations  made  there- 
upon. This  was  his  main  design  ;  and  the  treating  of  the 
original  right  of  tithes  was  intended  no  otherwise  than  as  a 
preface  to  this  work.  But  when  he  came  to  write  it,  tindmg 
it  swell  to  a  bulk,  beyond  what  he  had  expected,  he  thought 
it  best  to  publish  this  separately,  and  reserve  the  rest  for  a 
second  work,  having  already  made  collections  for  that  pur- 
pose. Whilst  he  was  engaged  in  this  undertaking,  the  un- 
happy distemper  of  the  stone  first  seized  him,  which  put  a 
stop  to  all  further  proceedings  :  for  in  order  to  complete  the 
work,  and  make  it  fully  answer  the  end  intended,  it  was  ne- 
cessary for  him  to  consult  the  Cotton  Library,  the  tower 
of  London,  and  other  places,  where  ancient  records  are  kept, 
which  he  could  not  do,  but  by  taking  a  journey  to  those 
places,  and  being  utterly  disabled  from  bearing  any  such  jour- 
ney by  his  distemper,  he  was  obliged  to  lay  aside  the  whole 
design. 

At  the  end  of  this  treatise  on  tithes,  he  published  the  bill, 
which  he  had  drawn  for  remedying  the  inconveniences  the 
church  suffers,  from  the  holding  pluralities  of  benefices,  with 
cure  of  souls  ;  his  reasons  for  this,  as  well  as  the  occasion  of 
his  writing  this  tract,  have  been  mentioned  above. 

In  the  year  1710,  being  disabled  by  the  stone  from  going 
any  more  into  the  pulpit,  he  resigned  his  vicarage  of  Trowse  ; 
and  the  chapter,  who  had  the  patronage  of  it,  gave  it  to  one 
of  their  minor  canons. 

When  this  distemper  first  came  upon  him  in  the  spring  of 
the  former  year,  he  apprehended  ii  was  the  stone  in  the 
kidney,  from  whence,  with  much  pain,  it  passed  into  the  blad- 
der, and  when  there,  as  he  imagined,  adhered  to  the  side  of 
it;  for  upon  his  taking  a  short  journey  into  the  country,  it 
was  broke  off  by  the  shaking  of  the  coach,  which  occasioned 
his  voiding  a  great  quantity  of  blood  ;  and  from  that  time  he 
lived  in  constant  pain,  till  he  was  cut  for  it,  two  years  alter. 
His  reasons  for  delaying  this  so  long  were,  that  being  now  past 
sixty,  he  was  apprehensive  it  would  be  impossible  for  him  to 
go  through  the  operation,  without  certain  death  to  him  ;  and 
imder  such  circumstances  to  put  hmiself  into  the  surgeon's 
hands,  would  be  little  better  than  self-murder  ;  and  rather 
than  be  guilty  of  this,  he  was  determined  to  submit  to  the 
will   of  God,  and  patiently  endure  his  calamity,  however 


46  THE  author's  life. 

grievous  and  tormenting  to  him.  This  he  did  for  two  years 
together,  sutfering  all  that  time  extreme  torment  with  great 
patience.  At  last,  the  disorder  grew  upon  him  so  much,  that 
there  was  little  probability  of  his  living  a  month  longer  with- 
out some  relief,  and  cutting  being  the  only  means  which 
gave  him  any  prospect  of  this,  he  was  convinced,  that  in  this 
case,  he  might  venture  to  run  the  hazard  of  it.  He  sent 
therefore  for  Mr.  Salter,  a  famous  lithotomist  then  in  London, 
to  perform  the  operation,  which  he  did  with  great  dexterity, 
drawing  out  the  stone,  which  was  nearly  of  the  shape  and 
size  of  a  sheep's  kidney,  in  less  than  three  minutes  time. 
After  the  operation,  Mr.  Salter  stayed  with  him  about  a  week; 
and  in  this  time  the  wound  healed  so  fast,  and  every  thing 
looked  so  well,  as  to  promise  a  certain  cure  in  a  month  or  six 
weeks  time.  Upon  this  Mr.  Salter  returned  to  London, 
leaving  him  in  the  hands  of  a  young  surgeon,  who  had  been 
bred  up  under  himself,  then  at  Norwich,  to  finish  the  cure, 
and  assured  the  dean,  he  would  be  as  safe  in  his  hands  as  in 
his  own.  But  every  thing  fell  out  just  the  contrary  ;  for 
after  he  had  been  under  the  care  of  this  surgeon  a  whole 
year,  he  seemed  to  be  much  farther  from  a  cure  than  when 
he  had  first  undertaken  him  ;  and  during  all  this  time  the 
dean  had  suffered  as  much  pain  and  torment  from  him,  as  he 
had  before  from  the  stone  itself.  Whilst  he  was  in  this  con- 
dition, lord  Somers  hearing  of  his  case,  was  pleased  to  ex- 
press himself,  that  he  thought  Dr.  Prideaux  a  person  of  greater 
value  than  to  be  so  lost ;  and  sent  a  message  to  Mr.  Salter, 
reprimanding  him  for  having  taken  so  little  care  of  him. 
This  produced  a  letter  from  Mr.  Salter  to  the  dean,  in  which 
he  earnestly  advised  and  desired  him  to  come  to  London  to 
him  ;  and  accordingly  the  dean,  finding  no  assistance  to  be 
had  where  he  was,  resolved  on  this  journey  ;  and  for  the 
convenience  of  his  travelling,  contrived  to  take  out  all  the 
seats  of  a  large  stage-coach,  in  which  he  laid  his  quilt  and 
other  bed-clothes,  and  lying  thereon  at  his  full  length,  was 
carried  to  London  with  as  much  ease  and  safety  as  if  he 
had  been  in  a  litter.  When  Mr.  Salter  came  to  him,  and  ex- 
amined into  his  case,  he  found  the  urinary  passage  ripped 
up  and  destroyed,  and  every  thing  so  miserably  mangled  and 
wounded,  that  he  expressed  no  little  wonder  to  find  him  alive 
after  usage,  which  he  thought  would  have  killed  any  body 
else.  Nothing  now  remained  but  to  cure  these  wounds, 
which  he  did  in  about  two  months  time,  when  the  dean  re- 
turned to  Norwich  again  ;  but  was  ever  after  this,  obliged  to 
void  his  urine  through  an  orifice,  left  in  the  place  where  the 
stone  had  been  extracted,  which  was  a  great  inconvenience 
to  him  all  his  life  after. 


THE  author's  life.  47 

On  his  return  to  Norwich,  he  again  applied  himseh"  to  his 
studies,  which  had  been  greatly  interrupted  b}  his  unhappy 
distemper.  The  first  thing  he  undertook  after  this,  was  to 
review  iiis  Directions  to  Churchzvardens,  upon  the  bookseller 
signifying  to  him.  that  he  intended  to  print  a  third  edition  of 
that  tract ;  and  having  made  large  additions  to  it,  a  third 
edition  was  printed  and  published  in  Michaelmas  term, 
1712. 

Having  finished  this  work,  he  went  on  with  his  Connexion 
of  the  History  of  the  Old  and  New  Testaments,  which  he  had 
begun  immediately  upon  his  dropping  the  design  of  writing 
The  History  of  Appropriations  ;  but  being  interrupted  by  his 
disorder  growing  upon  him,  was  obliged  to  lay  it  quite  aside, 
till  God  should  give  him  better  health  to  enable  him  to  pro- 
ceed in  it ;  and  having  now,  by  his  mercy,  in  some  measure 
obtained  this,  he  pursued  his  intention,  and  finished  the  first 
part  in  the  year  1715,  which  was  published  in  Michaelmas 
term  following.  The  second  part  came  out  two  years  after 
in  Hilary  term,  1717-18.  This  work,  at  the  end  of  the  year 
1720,  had  undergone  eight  editions  in  London,  besides  two 
or  three  printed, at  Dublin.*  Little  need  be  said  of  a  book 
which  is  so  generally  well  known,  and  has  been  read  by  most 
persons  of  all  ages,  who  delight  in  reading  at  all,  as  afibrding 
abundant  matter  for  the  instruction  as  well  as  entertainment 
of  all  sorts  of  persons.  In  a  work  of  this  kind,  which  is  so 
extensive  in  its  own  nature,  and  collected  from  such  variety 
of  authors  of  different  nations,  ages,  and  languages,  who  so 
often  contradict  one  another,  where  they  speak  of  the  same 
facts  and  persons,  and  sometimes  themselves,  it  is  not  to  be 
wondered  at,  if  there  are  some  mistakes  ;  but  much  more  so, 
that  so  ievf  of  these  have  hitherto  been  observed  by  the 
learned.  The  following  letters,  which  were  written  in  an- 
swer to  some  observations  of  this  kind,  sent  him  by  his  learn- 
ed and  ingenious  friend  and  kinsman,  Walter  Moyle,  Esq. 
will  sufficiently  testify,  with  what  candour  he  treated  such 
as  differed  from  his  opinions,  and  how  ready  he  was  to  re- 
examine and  correct  any  thing  that  was  thought  amiss. 

DR.   PRIDEAUX'S  FIRST  LETTER  TO  MR.  MOYLE. t 

"  Dear  Cousin,  I  thank  you  for  your  kind  letter,  and  the 
pains  you  have  taken  about  my  bo^k.  I  should  have  been 
glad  of  so  learned  a  friend  near  me,  to  whom  I  might  have 
communicated  this  history  before  it  was  printed.     But  now 

*  U  has  likewise  been  translated  into  the  French  and  Italian  languages, 
'  t  Vide  Moyle's  Works,  printed  at  London,  1726,  vol.  ii. 


48  THE    AUTHOR'S    Llit. 

three  editions  being  published  of  it,  your  observations  come 
too  late  to  be  of  any  use  for  the  correcting  of  any  thing  that 
is  mistaken.  However,  I  should  be  glad  to  have  all  that  you 
have  observed  ;  and  if  1  live  to  see  a  fourth  edition,  1  shall 
be  sure  to  examine  all  that  you  shall  suggest  to  be  amiss  ; 
and  as  1  shall  see  cause  for  it,  make  corrections  accordingly. 

"  As  to  your  first  observation,  concerning  the  East  India 
trade,  I  perceive,  my  good  cousin  has  not  observed,  that 
all  that  i  say  of  it,  is  of  the  trade  by  sea,  and  not  of  the 
trade  by  land.  I  thought  no  reader  would  have  understood 
it  otherwise  ;  but  since  you  have.  1  shall  in  the  second  part, 
where  I  shall  have  occasion  to  speak  of  this  matter  again, 
put  in  such  words,  as  shall  prevent  all  misunderstanding  of 
this  matter. 

"  As  to  what  you  wrote  of  Zoroastres,  I   am   of  nothing 
more  sure  in  ancient  history,  than  that  he  was  never  king  of 
Bactria,  or  any  other  than  a  juggling  impostor;  and  that  the 
time  of  his  flourishing  was  in  the  time  of  Darius  Hystaspes  : 
and  all  the  Greeks,  that  say  any  thing  to  the  purpose,  agree 
in  this  time.     For  his  being  king  of  Bactria,  and  his  making 
war  with  Ninus,  there  is   no   authority  but  that  of  Justin's, 
and  those  who  have  wrote  from  him.     All  the  Greeks  speak 
otherwise  of  him,  and  some  give  him  a  very  fabulous  antiquity. 
But  since  you  desire  only  to  have  it  proved  to  you,  that  he 
was  not  ancienter  than  the  time  of  Darius  Hystaspes,  I  will 
send  you  no  farther,  thati  to  the  place  in  the  proem  to  Dio- 
genes Laertius,  which  1  have  quoted  :  there  the  successors 
of  Zoroastres  being  named.  Ostanes  is  reckoned  the  first  of 
them,  and  he  came  into  Greece  with  Xerxes.     Suidas  calls 
him  ne^<r6f<!t;hi ;    but  there    were   no   Persomedians    before 
Cyrus   united   Media  and  Persia  together.     Suidas,   I   con- 
fess, is  no  old   author,    but    his  collection  is   made  out   of 
those  that  were  so ;  and  many   of  those  he  used  are  now 
lost.      That    he   is    made  contemporary   with   Pythagoras, 
is  another  reason  for  the  same  thing.     That  passage,  which 
you  refer  to  in  Arnobius,  if  it  proves  any   thing,  it  proves 
him    to    be    contemporary    with   Cyrus.      And    Apuleius, 
placing  him   in  the  time  of  Cambyses,  sufficiently  shows 
that  there  was  then  an   opinion,  that  he  lived   about  that 
time:    and  putting  all  this  together,   I   think  it  is  not  to  be 
doubted,  but  that  when  others  call  Zabratus,  Zaratus,  Zaras, 
Zaroes,    Nazaratus,  &c.  is  the  same   with  Zoroastres,  the 
character  of  the   person,  as  well   as   the  similitude   of  the 
names,  proving  this  opinion.     Perchance   Porphyrius  might 
think  Zabratus  and  Zoroastres  to  be  two  different  persons ; 
but  this  doth  not  prove  them  so,  Porphyry  living  many  hun- 
dreds of  years  after.     All  that  1  aim  to  prove  by  these  testi- 


Tim  AmrH©R''.-i  lip«.  -49 

mouies  is,  that  the  best  evidence  we  have  Aoni  among  the 
Greeks  and  Latins  for  the  time  of  Zoroastres,  placeth  him 
about  the  time  where  I  have  put  hin^.  But  as  to  the  exact 
chronology  of  all  his  actions,  (which  is  not  to  be  found  in 
this  or  any  other  matter  among  the  ancient  Greeks)  1  acknow- 
ledge I  follow  the  eastern  writers,  whose  books  are  all  full 
of  him,  and  that  noi  from  oral  tradition,  as  you  suppose,  but 
ancient  authors.  I'he  Arabs  indeed  had  no  learning  till  after 
the  time  of  Mahomet;  but  the  l^ersians  had;  and  from  very 
ancient  times.  And  therefore  1  believe  no  Arab  author  as  to 
this  matter  any  farther  than  he  writes  from  the  Persians  ;  and 
if  the  Persians  have  writings  of  this  matter  of  above  two 
thousand  years  standing,  why  should  not  they  be  believed  as 
well  as  Herodotus  or  Thucydides?  Zoroastres's  own  books 
are  still  extant  among  the  Magians  in  Persia  and  India;  and 
from  them  are  all  the  accounts  that  in  the  East  are  given  of 
him.  And  his  books  being  of  the  same  sacred  regard  among 
them  as  the  Alcoran  is  among  the  Mahometans,  it  is  not  hard 
to  conceive  they  should  be  preserved  v/ith  the  same  care. 
As  to  Texeita,  it  is  not  a  translation,  but  a  short  abstract  of 
Emir  Conda's  Persian  History  ;  that  history  is  ten  times  as 
big.  And  though  that  author  should  say  nothing  of  Zoroas- 
tres,  or  Zerdusht,  as  they  call  him,  this  would  not  prove  there 
was  no  such  person,  any  more  than  if  the  contested  passage 
in  Josephus  was  given  up  concerning  our  Saviour,  it  would 
prove  that  there  was  no  such  person  as  Jesus  Christ,  because 
then  there  would  be  no  mention  of  him  in  that  history.  If 
there  be  no  mention  of  Zerdusht  in  Emir  Conda,  a  good 
reason  may  be  given  for  it.  Emir  Conda  was  a  Persian  Ma- 
hometan, and  with  them  nothing  can  be  in  greater  contempt 
than  the  Magians  are  in  Persia  ;  and  that  might  be  cause 
enough  for  him  not  to  take  notice,  either  of  them  or  their 
prophet. 

"  I  beg  your  pardon,  I  have  not  time  to  go  over  ali  your 
papers  ;  others,  as  well  as  you,  call  for  the  second  part  of 
my  history  ;  and  being  now  in  the  last  scene  of  my  life,  and 
almost  at  the  end  of  that,  1  have  little  time  to  spare  from 
this  work  ;  wiiich  for  the  gratifying  of  you  and  others,  I 
would  gladly  finish  before  1  die  ;  but  if  1  live  to  finish  it,  and 
another  edition  should  be  published  of  the  first  part,  I  will 
then  thoroughly  examine  all  that  you  shall  offer,  but  think 
my  opinion,  as  to  the  time  of  Zoroastres,  to  be  too  well 
founded  ever  to  be  altered  by  me. 

I  am,  &c." 

Norwich,  Oct.  14.  1T16. 


Vor„  I. 


aO  THE    AOTiloU's    LIFE. 


SECOXD    LETTER. 

"  Dear  Cousin,  I  have  received  more  of  your  papers  :  tc 
answer  fully  all  that  you  object,  would  require  a  volume, 
which  f  have  not  time  or  strength  to  do,  being  almost  worn 
out  by  infirmity,  caused  by  the  calamity  1  have  suffered,  and 
my  advanced  age,  as  being  now  just  upon  the  seventieth  year 
of  my  life.  This  hath  so  far  broken  me,  as  to  confine  mc 
wholly  to  my  house,  and  mostly  to  my  chamber.  Only  since 
you  press  particularly  about  the  'Avab^c-/?,  my  answer  is,  that 
Xenophon  was  not  the  author  of  that  book,  but  Themisto- 
genes  of  Syracuse.  This  Xenophon  himself  says,  in  the  be- 
ginning of  the  third  book  of  his  Hellenics.  If  you  please  to 
consult  Ushers  Annals,  sub  Anno,  J.  P.  4313,  you  will  find 
this  there  more  fully  made  out.  I  have  indeed  quoted  that 
book  under  the  name  of  Xenophon,  because  of  the  common 
opinion,  which  every  where  attributes  it  to  him ;  but  I  think 
the  truth  is  otherwise.  I  perceive  you  hang  much  upon  the 
matter  of  Zoroastres  :  but  all  that  you  object  is  built  upon 
mistakes  :  if  you  do  not  place  him  where  I  have,  where  else 
will  you  place  him  ?  Will  you  put  him  with  Plutarch  five 
thousand  years  before  the  wars  of  Troy  ;  or  with  others  sis: 
thousand  years  before  the  time  of  Plato  ?  Others  indeed  re- 
duce the  thousands  to  hundreds;  but  all  is  fable,  for  the 
ancients  much  affected  a  fabulous  antiquity  for  all  they  relate. 
They  who  put  things  latest  are  generally  nearest  the  truth. 

It  is  easy  in  all  such  matters  to  make  objections  for  pulling 
down  ;  but  then  you  ought  to  build  up  better  in  their  stead. 
I  write  with  a  paralytical  hand,  which  makes  writing  difficult 
to  me  ;  for  which  I  also  need  your  pardon. 

1  am,  &€.'' 

Norwich,  Jan.  30, 1717. 


TKIRD    IvETTEK* 

'^^  Dear  Cousin,  Though  my  hand  be  almost  past  writing,  as 
you  will  sufficiently  see  by  this  letter,  yet  I  cannot  omit  thank- 
ing you  for  the  kindness  of  your  last.  I  hope  ere  this  you 
have  received  my  book.  1  am  sure  it  will  nowhere  find  a 
more  observing  and  judicious  reader  than  yourself.  I  had 
sufficient  experience  of  this  in  your  learned  remarks  on  the 
former  part.  They  have  instructed  me  for  the  making  some 
alterations  against  another  edition ;  but  however,  I  cannot 
recede  from  placing  the  Zoroastres,  who  was  Zerdusht  of 
the  Persians,  and  the  author  of  the  book  Tiundavestozn,  (which 


IS  the  Bible  of  the  Magians)  in  that  very  age  where  my  book 
has  placed  him.  To  say  otherwise  would  be  to  contradict 
all  the  ancient  histories  of  the  Persians,  and  the  general  tra- 
dition of  all  the  East.  What  you  object  out  of  Xanthus  Ly- 
dius,  who  lived  in  that  very  age  in  which  I  place  Zoroastres, 
looks  like  an  unanswerable  argument,  it  being  by  no  means 
likely,  that  this  author  should  assert  Zoroastres  to  have  lived 
six  hundred  years  before  the  expedition  of  Xerxes,  if  he 
was  his  contemporary.  One  answer  hereto  is,  the  history 
that  in  the  time  of  Diogenes  Laertius  went  under  the  name 
of  Xanthus  Lydius,  was  none  of  his,  but  written  by  Dyony- 
sius  Scytobrachion,  who  lived  a  little  before  the  time  of 
Tully  and  .Julius  Ccesar.  This  AtheiifEus  tells  us,  lib.  XII. 
and  quotes  for  it  Artemon  Cassandreus,  who  wrote  a  treatise 
on  purpose  to  make  a  distinction  of  the  genuine  authors 
from  the  spurious,  which  were  then  extant.  But  1  am  ra- 
ther apt  to  tliink  with  Pliny,  (hb.  XXX.  c.  1 .)  that  there  were 
two  Zoroastres,  tlie  elder  of  which  was  the  founder  of  the 
Magian  sect,  and  the  other  tlie  reformer  ;  and  that  this  latter 
was  the  Zerdusht  of  the  Persians,  and  lived  in  the  time 
where  I  have  placed  him.  IMiny,  in  the  chapter  last  quoted, 
tells  us  of  a  Zoroastres,  who  lived  but  a  little  before  {paulo 
ante  hunc,  are  his  words)  that  Ostanes,  who  came  with  Xerxes 
into  Greece.  Plato,  in  the  tenth  book  of  his  Politics, 
spoke  of  a  Zoroastres,  who  was  Herus  Armenius,  a  Pamphy- 
lian.  This  same  was  the  Armenius  Pamphilus,  who,  Arno- 
bius  tells  us,  was  familiarly  acquainted  with  Cyrus,  (See 
Clem.  Alex.  Strom.  V.  p.  436,  Edit.  Hins.  Arnob.  lib.  I.  p. 
31.)  I  acknowledge  the  passage  in  Arnobius  is  very  dark  ; 
but  if  it  signifies  any  thing,  it  must  signify  thus  much, 
that  there  was  a  Zoroastres,  who  lived  in  the  time  of  Cyrus. 
I  may  add  hereto,  that  the  antiquity,  which  most  of  the  an- 
cients among  the  Greeks  and  Latins  attribute  to  Zoroastres, 
is  notoriously  fabulous,  as  that  of  five  tliousand  years  before 
the  wars  of  Troy,  and  another  of  six  thousand  years  before 
the  times  of  Plato,  &:c.  In  most  pretences  to  antiquity,  it 
may  go  for  a  general  rule,  that  they  who  say  the  latest  say 
the  truest.  As  to  your  other  objection  against  Alexander's 
having  been  at  Jerusalem,  the  place  you  refer  to  in  Pliny, 
manifestly  makes  against  you  ;  for  tlie  words  there  plainly 
prove  that  Alexander  was  then  at  Jericho,  when  that  incision 
was  made  in  the  balsam-trees,  which  he  makes  mention  of; 
otherwise  these  words,  Alexandro  Magno  res  ibi gcrenie,  would 
be  very  impertinently  inserted;  and  if  he  were  at  Jericho, 
he  could  not  go  from  thence  to  Gaza,  without  taking  Jerusa- 
lem in  his  way.  The  words  in  Pliny  to  me  plainly  imply 
that  Alexander  was  at  Jericho  when  that  incision  was  made, 


oii  WFr:  AUTucn  s   fife,; 

and  that  Jt  was  made  at  that  time  for  his  sake,  to  gather  some 
of  the  balsam.  That  an  extraordinary  providence  has  always 
attended  that  people  for  their  preservation  is  manifest.  That 
they  are  now  in  being,  is  a  sufficient  proof  hereof. 

1  am,  &c." 
Norwich,  July  10,  1718. 

FOURTH    LETTER. 

'^  Dear  Comln,  I  do  most  heartily  thank  you  for  your  kind 
letter,  especially  for  the  observations  which  you  have  sent 
me  of  my, mistakes  in  the  last  part  ofmy  history.  I  must  con- 
fess that  about  Octavius's  posterity  is  a  \cvy  great  one.  It  is 
a  downright  blunder  ofmy  old  head  ;  and  I  am  glad  so  accu- 
rate and  learned  a  reader  has  not  observed  more  of  them. 
This  makes  mc  hope  that  no  more  such  have  escaped  me.  \ 
have  mended  this  and  all  the  other?  you  have  taken  notice  of; 
only  1  cannot  make  Socrates  a  sodomite.  The  place  in  Ju- 
venal,  which  you  mention,  reflects  on  him  for  his  affection  to 
Alcibiades,  as  if  that  were  a  sodomitical  amour.  I  am  past 
labouring  any  further,  being  now  past  the  seventieth  year  of 
my  age;  if  I  outlive  the  ensuing  winter,  it  is  more  than  1  expect, 
or  indeed  desire  *,  for  I  have  now  upon  me  those  decays  both 
of  body  and  mind,  as  make  me  fully  sensible.  Gravis  est  et 
dura  senectus.  Every  body  cannot  live  so  long  as  my  aunt 
M.  M.  though  perchance  I  might  have  lived  much  longer, 
and  in  full  vigour,  had  not  my  great  calamity  come  athwart 
me :  considering  that,  it  is  much  that  I  have  lasted  so  long. 
T  bless  God  for  all  his  mercies  hitherto. 

I  am.  dear  cousin.  <&:c," 

N'onvich,  Sept.  6,  1718. 


The  learned  and  ingenious  Mr.  Warburton  has  likewise  dil- 
fcred  from  Dr.  Prideaux  as  to  the  age  of  Zoroastres,  in  his 
Demonstratioji  of  the  Divine  Legation  nf  Moses. 

In  Hilary  term,  A.  D.  1717,  he  published  the  Second  Part 
of  the  Connexion  of  the  History  of  the  Old  and  Kcw  Testaments, 
and  dedicated  this  part,  as  he  had  done  the  former,  to  the 
earl  of  Nottingham,  in  acknowledgment  of  the  favours  he 
had  received  from  that  nobleman. 

This  history  was  the  last  work  he  fini.*hed  for  the  public ; 
for  he  being  now  past  his  seventieth  year,  he  found  infirmities 
grow  very  t'asl  upon  him  ;  and  these  were  hastened  on  by 
what  he  had  sutfered  in  being  cut  for  the  stone,  and  the  ill 
management  he  had  afterward  fallen  under.  About  this  time, 
he  was  seized  with  a  paralytical  shaking  in  his  left  hand, 
which  si^s  years  aften  seized  his  right  also,  and  at  length  weak- 


•THE    AUTHORS    LliK.  5:1 

cned  it  to  that  degree,  that  he  could  no  longer  hold  a  pen  to 
nvrite  with ;  and  as  these  weaknesses  of  body  crept  on  him,  they 
much  impaired  and  weakened  the  vigour  of  his  mind,  so  that 
he  could  no  longer  carry  on  his  studies  with  his  usual  strength 
and  assiduity,  which  made  him  think  it  time  to  give  over,  as 
one  superannuated  for  any  further  undertaking;  and  therefore, 
though  he  had  other  works  m  design,  and  for  some  of  them 
had  materials  in  a  great  measure  in  readiness  for  the  compo- 
sure, he  thought  it  properest  to  drop  them  all,  as  not  expect- 
ing he  should  live  long  enough  to  finish  whatever  he  should 
begin  ;  and  that,  if  he  did  finish  any  thing  under  these  decays 
and  infirmities,  it  would  be  liable  to  great  errors  ;  and  he  did 
not  think  it  proper  either  to  hazard  iiis  own  character,  or  af- 
front the  public  so  far  as  to  offer  any  thing  of  this  kind.  And. 
therefore  for  the  remaining  part  of  his  life,  he  was  resolved  to 
send  nothing  more  to  the  press,  but  confined  himself  solely  to 
the  duties  of  the  station  to  which  he  was  called;  and  faithfully 
to  discharge  these,  and  bear  the  burden  of  his  mfirmities,  v/as 
work  enough  for  him  during  ine  latter  part  of  his  life. 

For  some  lime  after  the  publication  of  his  Connexion  of 
the  History  of  the  Old  and  Aezu  Testaments,  seldom  a  week 
passed  without  his  receiving  letters  with  remarks  and  obser- 
vations upon  it  from  the  learned,  indifferent  parts  of  the 
kingdom;  some  raising  difficulties,  others  desiring  information 
as  to  the  explaining  some  difficult  passages  in  it.  To  all  these 
he  constantly  returned  answers,  and  gave  the  best  satisfaction 
be  could,  till  by  his  age  and  other  infirmities  he  became  inca- 
pable of  bending  his  mind  to  any  matter  of  difficulty. 

Of  all  those  who  made  objections  or  remarks,  there  was  no 
one  who  did  it  with  more  learning  or  strength  of  argument 
than  his  worthy  kinsman,  Waiter  Moyle,  Esq.  of  Bake,  in  the 
county  of  Cornwall,  who  has  been  mentioned  above.  This 
gentleman,  for  his  great  learning,  judgment,  and  v/it,  mixed 
with  uncommon  humanity  and  sweetness  of  temper,  was  just- 
ly esteemed  by  every  one  who  had  the  happiness  of  being  ac- 
quainted with  him.  In  the  younger  part  of  his  life,  he  had 
served  in  parliament  several  years  during  the  reign  of  king 
William,  where  he  made  a  considerable  figure  by  his  great 
knowledge  and  learning,  much  beyond  what  could  be  expect- 
ed at  his  years.  Afterward  he  retired  into  the  country,  and 
lived  at  his  seat  in  Cornwall  upwards  of  twenty  years  before 
he  died,  where  he  collected  together  a  well-chosen  library 
of  books,  and  among  these  spent  the  remainder  of  his  life. 
He  was  one  of  those  persons,  who,  unhappily  for  the  learned 
world,  had  no  opinion  of  his  own  v.'ritings  ;  and  therefore  not 
long  before  he  died,  destroyed  most  of  his  finished  perform- 
ances. He  died  on  the  9th  of  June,  A.  D.  17S1.  in  the  forty- 
ninth  year  of  his  age. 


^4  a'HK   author's  LIFt. 

From  the  year  168G,  to  the  time  of  his  death,  Dr.  Fri- 
deaux  constantly  resided  at  the  cathedral,  of  which  he  was  a 
member,  excepting  only  the  lour  years  that  he  lived  at  Sa- 
ham.  How  he  employed  himself  there,  appears  sufficiently 
from  what  has  been  said  above.  During  all  the  time  that  he 
was  dean,  he  never  had  the  least  difference  with  the  chapter, 
or  any  of  the  members  of  it,  which  other  deans,  his  predeces- 
sors, were  hardly  ever  free  from.  This  was  owing  to  the  pru- 
dence and  integrity  of  his  conduct  towards  them  ;  for  he  al- 
ways treated  the  prebetidaries  with  all  ihe  respect  that  was 
due  to  them,  and  was  as  careful  of  their  rights  as  of  his  own  ; 
and  never  took  upon  him  to  determine  any  thing  of  the  com- 
mon right  and  interest  of  the  church,  without  the  commoa 
consent  and  advice  of  the  chapter.  In  all  his  transactions  with 
them  he  never  hid  or  concealed  any  thing  from,  but  constantly 
laid  all  their  affairs  openly  and  fairly  before  them,  as  having  no 
views  or  by-ends  of  his  own  to  serve  ;  and  this  was  a  method  of 
proceeding,  which  that  church  had  not  always  been  used  to. 
and  so  far  gained  him  their  confidence  and  esteem,  that  they 
trusted  all  their  affairs  in  his  hands,  without  any  reserve, 
as  having  never  found  themselves  deceived  by  his  m.anage- 
ment.  His  residing  constantly  at  the  cathedral  gave  him  an 
opportunity  of  looking  after  the  fabric  of  the  church,  and  see- 
ing that  it  was  kept  in  good  repair :  and  this  he  took  care  of 
as  well  before  as  after  he  was  dean ;  for,  while  he  was  pre- 
bendary, he  was  generally  treasurer;  and  to  repair  the  church 
was  one  main  part  of  his  office.  His  method  was  according 
to  the  direction  of  the  local  statutes,  to  order  the  church  every 
Lady-day  to  be  carefully  reviewed  b)  able  workmen,  and,  if 
any  decays  were  found,  he  took  care  to  have  them  repaired 
by  the  Michaelmas  following,  unless  they  were  so  great,  as  to 
exceed  what  the  revenues  of  the  church  could  bear;  and  then, 
what  could  not  be  done  in  one  year  was  done  in  two.  And, 
had  he  not  been  thus  careful  one  year  particularly,  and  put 
the  spire,  which  is  a  beautiful  edifice,  in  thorough  good  re- 
pair, it  would  in  all  probability  have  been  blown  down  by  a 
great  storm,  which  happened  very  soon  after  he  had  caused 
it  to  be  repaired,  and  must,  in  falling,  have  crushed  and  ruin- 
ed a  great  part  of  the  church. 

In  the  seventy-fourth  year  of  his  age,  finding  himself  so 
much  weakened  by  his  infirmities  growing  upon  him,  that  he 
could  no  longer  use  his  books  as  iormerly,and  being  desirous 
that  his  collection  of  oriental  books  should  not  be  dispersed, 
but  kept  altogether  in  some  public  library,  he  permitted  his 
son,  who  had  been  educated  at  that  college,  to  make  a  present 
of  them  to  the  society  of  Clare-hall,  in  Cambridge  ;  and  ac- 
cordingly they  were  sent  thitlier.  and  p;aced  in  the  college  li- 
brary, to  the  number  of  three  luindred  volumes  and  upwards.. 


THE   AUTHORS    LiFE.  do 

About  a  year  before  his  death  he  was  taken  with  an  illness, 
which  so  far  reduced  him  as  to  confine  him  wholly  to  his 
chamber  ;  and  at  last  his  infirmities  increased  to  such  a  de- 
gree, as  rendered  him  incapable  of  helping  himself  in  the 
common  offices  of  life.  All  this  was  the  effect  of  the  ill  con- 
duct he  fell  under  after  his  being  cut  for  the  stone ;  for  the  long 
confinement  he  then  underwent,  and  the  loss  of  blood  he  sus- 
tained, weakened  him  so  much  in  the  limbs,  that  he  was  never 
free  from  paralytical  shaking  and  rheumatic  pains  ;  so  that  he 
gave  himself  up  to  the  thoughts  of  death,  expecting  itwith  that 
cheerfulness  and  resignation,  which  naturally  flow  from  the 
reflection  on  a  life  well  spent.  He  expired  on  Sunday 
evening,  the  first  of  November,  A.  D.  1724,  in  the  seventy- 
seventh  year  of  his  age,  after  an  illness  of  about  ten  days,  and 
was  buried,  according  to  his  own  direction,  in  the  cathedral 
of  Norwich,  on  the  Wednesday  following. 

Thus  much  has  been  said  of  his  life  and  conversation  in 
general ;  as  the  reader  may  possibly  be  desirous  of  a  more 
particular  insight  into  his  character  and  manner  of  life,  the 
following  account  is  taken  from  the  report  of  those  who  knew 
him  best,  and  conversed  with  him  most  intimately. 

Dr.  Prideaux  was  naturally  of  a  very  strong,  robust  consti- 
tution, which  enabled  him  to  pursue  his  studies  with  great  as- 
siduity: and  notwithstanding  his  close  application,  and  seden- 
tary manner  of  life,  enjoyed  great  vigour  both  of  body  and 
mind  for  many  years  together,  till  he  was  seized  with  the 
unhappy  distemper  of  the  stone.  His  parts  were  very  good, 
rather  solid  than  lively :  his  judgment  excellent.  As  a  wri- 
ter, he  was  clear,  strong,  and  intelligent,  without  any  pomp  of 
language,  or  ostentation  of  eloquence.  His  conversation 
was  a  good  deal  of  the  same  kind,  learned  and  instruc- 
tive, with  a  conciseness  of  expression  on  many  occasions, 
which  to  those,  who  were  not  well  acquainted  with  him. 
had  sometimes  the  appearance  of  rusticity.  In  his  manner 
of  life,  he  was  very  regular  and  temperate,  being  seldom 
out  of  his  bed  after  ten  at  night,  and  generally  rose  to  his  stu- 
dies before  five  in  the  morning.  His  manners  were  sincere 
and  candid.  He  generally  spoke  his  mind  with  freed  /m  and 
boldness,  and  was  not  easily  diverted  from  pursuing  what  he 
thought  right.  In  his  friendships  he  was  constant  and  invaria- 
ble ;  to  his  family  he  was  an  affectionate  husband,  a  tender  and 
careful  father,  and  greatly  esteemed  by  his  friends  and  rela- 
tions, as  he  was  very  serviceable  to  them  on  all  occasions.  As  a 
clergyman,  he  was  strict  and  punctual  in  the  performance  of 
all  the  duties  of  his  functions  himself,  and  carefully  exacted 
the  same  from  the  inferior  clergy  and  canons  ot  his  church. 
In  party  matters,  so  far  as  he  was  concerned,  he  always  show- 


Jb  I'-H-E  AO'lHOR'Si  ^If*:. 

cd  himself  {irmly  attached  to  the  interest  of  the  Protestant 
cause,  and  principles  of  the  revolution;  but  without  joining  la 
with  the  violence  of  parties,  or  promoting  those  factions  and 
divisions,  which  prevailed  both  in  the  church  and  state,  during 
thegreater  part  of  his  life.  His  integrity  and  moderation,  which 
should  have  recommended  him  to  some  of  the  higher  stations 
in  the  church,  were  manifestly  the  occasion  of  his  being  neg- 
lected ;  for  busy  party-zealuts,  and  men  more  conversant  in 
the  arts  of  a  court,  were  easily  preferred  over  him,  whose 
highest,  and  only  ambition  was,  carefully  to  perform  what 
was  incumbent  on  him  in  every  station  in  life,  and  to  acquit 
himself  of  his  duty  to  his  God,  his  friends,  and  his  country. 


A  LETTBE    FROM   THE  BISWOP  OF    WORCESTER,  TO  THE    BISHOP 
OF  NORWICH. 

Dr.  William  Lloyd,*  the  most  worthy  and  learned  lord 
hishop  of  Worcester,  having,  through  the  hands  of  Dr.  Trim- 
nell,  bishop  of  Norwich,  communicated  to  Dr.  Prideaux,  deaa 
of  Norwich,  his  scheme  of  the  seventy  weeks  of  Daniel,  and 
his  solution  of  them  ;  Dr.  Prideaux,  in  a  letter  writ  thereon 
to  the  bishop  of  Norwich,  objected  against  it,  that  there  were 
many  things  in  the  book  of  Nehemiah,  which  the  said  scheme 
of  Daniel's  weeks  is  inconsistent  with  ;  which  being  commu- 
nicated to  the  said  bishop  of  Worcester,  his  lordship  writ 
thereon  to  the  said  bishop  of  Norwich  this  following  letter. 

Hartlebury,  June  21,  1710. 
My  very  good  Lord,  In  that  part  which  you  gave  me  of  my 
most  learned  friend.  Dr.  Prideaux's  letter  to  your  lordship,  he 
speaks  of  many  things  in  the  book  of  Nehemiah,  with  which 
my  account  of  Daniel's  weeks  is  inconsistent  in  his  opinion. 
But  he  mentions  not  many  things,  only  two  or  three  in  his 
letter  ;  and  these  are  such,  as,  I  conceive,  I  need  not  trouble 
my  head  with  ;  for  they  signify  nothing  to  my  business,  which 
is  only  to  show,  that,  from  the  going  forth  of  the  command- 
ment to  build  Jerusalem  again,  to  the  death  of  Christ,  the 
cutting  off  the  Messiah,  there  should  be  seven  weeks,  and 
sixty-two  weeks ;  seven  weeks,  that  is  49  years,  to  the  end  of 
the  vision  and  prophecy,  (Dan.  ix.  24.)  that  is,  till  the  book  of 
Malachi  was  written  ;  and  the  other  sixty-two  weeks,  or  434 
years,  till  the  anointing  of  the  most  holy,  (ib.)  that  is,  till 
Christ's  being  anointed  high-priest,  with  the  blood  of  his  own 
sacrifice,  as  he  was  at  the  lime  of  his  death,  when  the  Messias 

,  •   See  tlic  General  Diction,  vol,  vii,  fcc.  p.  1S2— 141.     Art.  W,  Lloyd.— Dr 
.PniflfTsnx's  ito.  Pamphlet?,  No.  13 


4'HE  Author's  life.  5^7 

was  cut  off,  (v.  26.)  upon  which  the  Jews  came  to  lie,  i.  e. 
no7i  ei,  as  it  followeth. 

The  Jews,  whom  Danie!  every  where  in  his  prayer  calls 
thy  people,  God's  people,  &:c.  here  the  angel,  speaking  from 
God,  throws  back  upon  Daniel,  and  calls  them  thy  people,  that 
is,  Daniel's  people,  (v.  23,  24,)  and  in  these  words  (v.  26.)  the 
angel  shows  how  they  would  cease  to  be  God's  people:  it 
was  upon  the  Messias  being  cut  off,  which  was  done  even  by 
themselves  ;  and,  after  that,  they  were  therefore  not  his  people. 
But  who  were  to  be  his  people,  after  this  ?  Even  the  Romans. 
They  are  here  9alled  Principis  populus  futurus .  Even  they, 
that  were  to  burn  the  city  and  temple,  i.  c.  the  Romans. 

I  am  gone  beyond  what  I  needed  to  have  written  on  this  oc- 
casion- My  business  was  only  to  show,  from  the  going  forth 
of  the  commandment  for  the  building  of  the  city  of  Jerusalem, 
till  the  cutting  off  the  Messias ;  and  thereupon,  the  Jews  being 
no  more  his  people,  was  to  be  seven  weeks,  and  sixty-two 
weeks;  in  the  whole  sixty-nine  weeks,  or  433  years. 

I  do  here  take  it  for  granted,  that  Daniel's  years  were  just 
360  days  in  a  year,  such  as  those  king  Croesus  reckoned  by,  as 
it  appears  in  Herodotus  (I.  28.)  Of  this,  I  believe,  Mr.  Deari 
needs  no  proof;  but  if  he  pleases,  I  will  send  him  so  much, 
as,  I  am  sure,  will  be  sufficient. 

Now,  483  times  360  days  makes  the  sum  of  173,880  days, 
which  number  of  da}'s,  beginning  in  the  month  of  Nisan,  in 
the  20th  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  (Neh.  ii.  1,  6.)  that  is, 
in  the  year  445,  before  Christ,  about  the  end  of  April,  will 
certainly  end  about  May,  A.  D.  33.  But  that  time  was  after 
the  passover,  for  that  year  ;  and  therefore  Christ  could  not 
die  in  that  year,  for  he  could  not  die  but  at  the  time  of  the 
passover:  on  that  day,  and  at  that  hour,  in  vvhich  the  passover 
lamb  was  to  be  killed,  then  was  Christ  our  passover  to  be 
sacrificed  for  us.  But  that  must  have  been  A.  D.  33.  Then 
that  passover  happened  on  Friday,  April  3;  then  at  three  in 
the  afternoon  Christ  must  die  :  it  should  be  neither  later  nor 
sooner.  That  Christ  did  die  at  tliat  very  time,  it  may  be 
eagily  proved  by  demonstration ;  and  I  have  showed  it, 
where  there  is  occasion  :  but,  at  this  time,  I  am  only  to  give 
account,  how  this,  that  hath  been  said,  can  consist  with  those 
things  of  Jaddusand  of  Sanballat,  in  Mr.  Dean's  letter. 

First,  of  Sanballat;  Mr.  Dean  seems  to  think,  that  he  of 
that  name,  who  gave  disturbance  to  the  building  of  the  wall 
(Neh.  ii.  6.)  was  the  same  with  him,  that  is  spoken  of  Neh. 
xiii.  28,  on  the  occasion  of  one  of  the  sons  of  Joiada,  the  high- 
priest,  having  married  his  daughter  :  for  that  these  are  two 
Sanballats,  is  certain  ;  for  the  former  Sanballat,  Neh.  ii.  IG. 
was  governor  of  one  of  the  small  provinces  in  or  about  Pn- 
\m^  T.  R 


.^&  THE    AOTHOR'S    LIFE. 

Icslinc,  in  the  year  445,  before  Christ,  which  was  the  time  ot 
that  building  of  the  wall  of  Jerusalem,  Neh.  vi.  15.  It  must 
have  been  another  Sanballat,  that  was  father-in-law  of 
Manasseh,  whom  all  take  to  have  been  him  that  is  spoken  of 
in  the  last  chapter  of  Nehemiah ;  for  this  Sanballat  came  to 
Alexander  the  Great,  first  at  the  siege  of  Tyre,  in  the  year  332, 
before  Christ,  which  was  113  years  after  the  building  of  the 
wall ;  and  he  died  in  October  following,  that  is,  after  the  ta- 
king of  Gaza,  and  just  before  Alexander's  coming  to  Jerusa- 
lem.    Joseph.  Antiq.  xi.  8. 

Soon  after,  viz.  in  the  year  323,  before  Christ,  May  23,  was 
the  death  of  Alexander  the  Great ;  and,  about  the  same  time, 
died  Jaddus  the  high-priest,  as  Josephus  tells  us,  at  the  very 
end  of  the  same  chapter,  xi.  8. 

Of  Jaddus,  Josephus  tells  us,  that,  immediately  after  his 
death,  his  son  Onias  succeeded  him  in  the  high-priesthood. 
This  Onias  must  then  have  been  at  least  thirty  years  old ;  he 
might  have  been  a  great  deal  more ;  and,  if  he  was  the  high- 
priest,  of  whom  Hecataeus  wrote,  that  eleven  years  after  Alex- 
ander's death,  he  saw  him,  being  then  sixty-six  years  of  age, 
as  Josephus  [contra  Jlpionem,  lib.  I.  Edit.  Crispini,  1048,  D.) 
tells  us,  from  that  history,  by  this  reckoning  Onias  must  have 
been  born  in  the  year  378,  before  Christ;  and  then  his  father 
Jaddus,  likely,  was  born  before  the  year  400,  before  Christ ; 
it  may  very  well  be  that  he  was  born  before  the  year  404, 
before  Christ,  which  was  the  last  year  of  Darius  Nothus. 
This  king,  as  Primate  Usher  {Annal.  I.  p.  232.)  thinks,  was 
Darius  the  Persian,  to  the  time  of  whose  reign,  all  the  Levites 
were  reckoned,  in  the  times  of  Eliashib,  Joiada,  Johanan,  and 
Jaddua,  as  we  read,  Neh.  xii.  22.  That  most  learned  primate 
takes  it  for  granted  that  the  Jaddua,  here  spoken  of,  was  not 
then  high-priest  at  the  time  of  the  reckoning  of  these  Levites ; 
but,  being  then  born,  and  being  heir  apparent  of  the  high- 
priesthood,  that  holy  writer  might  name  him  together  with 
those  of  his  progenitors,  that  were  all  living  together.  It  is 
not  said  there,  or  any  where  else,  in  the  book  of  Nehemiah, 
that  Jaddua  was  then  high-priest ;  only  it  is  said,  chap.  xii.  1 1 , 
that  Jonathan  begat  Jaddua  ;  and,  verse  22,  that  such  things 
happened  in  their  days.  But,  in  the  next  verse,  it  is  said, 
that  the  Levites  were  written  in  the  books  of  the  Chronicles, 
even  until  the  days  of  Johanan,  the  son  of  Eliashib ;  which 
giveth  cause  to  think,  that  Joiada  was  never  high-priest,  but 
died  before  his  father  Eliashib.  And,  one  might  be  well  con- 
firmed in  that  opinion,  by  what  he  reads  in  Neh.  xiii.  28,  that 
he  that  married  Sanballat's  daughter,  was  of  the  sons  of 
Joiada,  the  son  of  Eliashib,  the  high-priest.  If  Joiada  him- 
self had  lived  to  be  high-priest,  the  writer  would  have  said 


THE   AUXHOR's    life.  59 

m  fewer  words,  that  he,  that  had  married  so,  was  the  son  of 
vToiada,  the  high-priest.  I  know  nothing  of  moment  against 
this,  but  a  word  or  two,  that  we  read  of  Joiada's  succeeding 
his  father,  in  Josephus,  Antiq.  xi.  7.  But  his  word,  alone, 
will  be  of  no  great  authority  with  any  one,  that  considers  how 
little  he  knew  of  the  Jews,  in  those  times,  or  of  the  Persian 
monarchy, 

The  best  of  it  is,  that  all  that  we  have  in  the  book  of  Ne- 
hemiah,  concerning  these  times,  after  the  going  forth  of  the 
commandment  to  build  Jerusalem  again,  is  altogether  foreign 
to  the  matter  now  before  us :  it  can  neither  help  us,  nor  hin- 
der us,  in  the  knowledge  of  those  seven  weeks,  and  sixty-two 
weeks,  that  we  read  of  in  the  angel's  prophecy. 

I  desire  Mr.  Dean  to  take  notice,  that  I  do  not  reckon  the 
years  of  any  king's  reign  any  otherwise  than  as  I  find  them  in 
Ptolomy''s  Canon. 

I  desire  your  lordship  to  thank  him  for  his  kind  remem- 
brance of  me,  and  to  let  him  know,  that  I  do  heartily  desire 
his  prayers,  as  I  do  also  your  lordship's ;  for  I  truly  am  your 
most  affectionate  brother  and  servant, 

W.  Worcester, 


DR.  rniDEAUX'S    ANSWER. 

Dr.  Prideaux,  having  received  from  the  lord  bishop  of  Nor- 
wich a  copy  of  this  letter,  wrote  unto  the  lord  bishop  of  Wor- 
cester this  following  letter,  in  answer  thereto: — 

My  Lord,  I  must  acknowledge  it  is  a  very  great  favour,  that 
your  lordship  would  be  pleased  to  give  yourself  so  much 
trouble,  as  to  draw  up  the  paper  for  my  satisfaction,  which 
you  sent  to  the  lord  of  Norwich  for  me,  and  which  his  lordship 
has  been  pleased  to  communicate  unto  me. 

Therein  you  say,  that  the  objections  I  made  against  your 
scheme  of  Daniel's  Aveeks,  from  the  book  of  Nehemiah,  were 
nothing  to  your  business,  which  is  only  to  show  that,  from  the 
going  forth  of  the  commandment  for  the  building  of  the  city 
of  Jerusalem,  till  the  cutting  off  of  the  Messias,  was  to  be 
seven  weeks,  and  sixty-two  weeks,  that  is,  in  all  sixty-nine 
weeks,  or  483  years  ;  and  that,  computing  these  years  from 
the  20th  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  when  that  command- 
ment went  forth,  they  exactly  end,  according  to  Ptolomy's 
canon,  at  the  time  of  our  Saviour's  death.  But  I  humbly 
conceive,  that,  unless  it  be  made  out,  that  the  beginning  of 
this  computation  must  be  from  the  20th  year  of  Artaxerxes 
Longimanus,  your  hypothesis  cannot  stand  :  and  therefore  it 
must  be  your  lordship's  business,  in  the  first  place,  to  clear 
this  matter. 


<;(')  7HF,    AIITJIGr'.-^    lite.- 

It  is  said  indeed  in  Nehemiah,  that  the  commandment  lor 
the  rrbuilding  of  the  city  of. Jerusalem  went  out  in  the  20th 
year  ot'  Arlaxcrxes.  But  there  were  two  Artaxerxes  whom 
this  might  be  attributed  to,  Ar(axerxcs  Longimanus  and 
Artaxerxes  Mncmon  ;  and  the  text  doth  not  determine  which 
of  these  two  it  was.  If  it  were  Artaxerxcs  Mnemon,  all  that 
is  said  in  Nehemiah  of  Jaddua,  Sanballat,  and  Darius  Codo- 
mannus,  will  very  well  consist  therewith  ;  for  it  is  but  to  sup- 
pose, that  Nehemiah  lived  to  the  time  of  Darius  Codomannus, 
and  then  wrote  his  book  (as  he  might  very  well  do,  without 
exceeding  the  age  of  eighty  years)  and  all  will  be  solved  and 
made  consistent ;  and  therefore  Scaliger,  Calvisius,  Helvicus, 
and  several  other  chronologers,  come  into  this  opinion. 
J3ut,  if  it  were  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  as  your  lordship  says 
it  was,  in  whose  20th  year  this  commandment  went  forth; 
then  all  the  objections  occur,  which  1  have   mentioned;  for, 

1st,  it  seems  evident  to  me,  that  the  text  of  Nehemiah  xii. 
22,  where  the  Levites  are  spoken  of,  that  were  in  the  days  of 
Eliashib,  Joiada,  Johanan,  and  Jaddua,  cannot  be  understood 
to  mean  any  other  days  than  those  wherein  they  were  high- 
priests.  For  the  high-priest  among  the  Jews  was  the  head  of 
rhe  priests  and  Levites;  and  after  the  captivity,  when  there 
was  no  king  in  Judah,  had  the  absolute  supremacy  in  all  af- 
fairs relating  to  them  ;  and  therefore  it  was  as  proper  for  them 
to  reckon  all  such  atlairs  by  times  of  their  high-priests,  as  it 
is  now  with  us  to  reckon  of  all  actions  in  the  state  by  the 
times  of  our  kings;  and  consequently,  when  any  thing  is  said 
to  have  been  in  such  an  high-priest's  time,  it  is  as  improper 
to  understand  it  of  any  other  time,  than  that  of  his  priesthood, 
us  it  would  be,  when  any  thing  is  said  to  have  been  in  such  a 
king-s  time,  to  imderstand  it  of  any  other  time  than  that  of  his 
reign.  For  this  reason  1  cannot  come  into  this  interpretation, 
which  refers  what  is  said  here  of  the  days  of  Jaddua  as  far 
back  as  the  days  of  his  childhood  ;  for  it  seems  to  be  a  very 
forced  sense,  which  the  text  cannot  naturally  bear.  When 
such  a  thing  is  said  to  have  been  in  the  time  of  Henry  the 
P/ighth,  will  any  one  understand  it  of  the  time  before  his 
reign  ;  or  think  it  any  other  than  an  absurdity  so  to  construe 
it?  And,  to  me,  it  looks  altogether  as  bad,  as  to  understand 
what  is  here  said  of  the  Levites  to  have  been  in  the  days  of 
Jaddua,  of  any  other  da}s  than  those  wherein  he  was  high- 
priest.  And  it  is  to  be  taken  notice  of,  that  the  text  joins  with 
the  days  of  Jaddua,  the  days  of  Eliashib,  Joiada,  and  Johanan, 
wlio  were  high-priests  before  him.  For  it  is  said,  in  the  days 
of  Eliashib,  Joiada,  Johanan,  Jaddua.  «fec.  And  here  I  would 
ask,  whether  the  days  of  Eliashib,  Joiada,  and  Johanan,  are 
\o  be  understood  of  the  days  of  their  high-priesthood,  or  of. 


THE    author's    life.  CI 

the  days  of  their  life  ?  No  doubt,  it  will  be  said  of  the  days 
of  their  high-priesthood.  And  why  then  must  not  the  days  of 
Jaddua  be  understood  so  too  ?  1  may  add  further,  What  need 
is  there,  in  this  case,  to  name  Jaddua's  days  at  all  ?  Because, 
if  they  be  understood  of  those  before  he  was  high-priest,  they 
were  coincident  with  the  days  of  Joiada  and  Johanan,  which 
were  named  before.  And  therefore,  if  we  understand  those 
days  of  Jaddua  of  any  other  days  than  those  wherein  he  was 
high-priest,  they  must  have  been  named  twice  in  the  same 
text,  which  would  be  such  a  faulty  repetition,  as  it  must  not 
be  charged  with.  Nothuig  seems  more  plain  to  me,  than  that 
the  text  speaks  of  the  days  of  these  four  men,  as  in  succession, 
one  after  the  other;  and  therefore  we  must  not  ruf.i  tlie  days 
of  the  one  into  the  days  of  the  other.  Besides,  the  whole 
design  of  interpreting  the  days  ol  Jaddua,  of  tlie  days  before 
he  was  high-priest,  is  to  support  a  notion,  that  the  book  of 
Nehemiah,  of  which  this  text  is  a  part,  was  wrote  before  he 
was  high-priest,  and  so  lar  back  as  the  time  of  his  childhood* 
Your  lordship  placeth  it  in  the  last  year  of  Darius  Nothus. 
But  then,  to  name  his  day&  with  the  days  of  the  other  high- 
priests,  so  many  years  before  he  came  to  be  high-priest,  and 
when  it  must  be,  on  many  respects,  uncertain  whether  he 
would  ever  be  so  or  not,  is  what,  1  believe,  all  the  writings  of 
the  world  beside  cannot  give  us  an  instance  of.  For  these 
reasons,  I  cannot  but  be  of  opinion,  that  these  days  of  Jaddua 
can  be  meant  of  none  other  than  the  days  of  his  high-priest- 
hood ;  and  that  therefore  he  was  in  that  office  before  this  text 
was  written  :  and  it  also  appears  to  me,  that  the  Darius  here 
mentioned,  can  be  none  other  than  Darius  Codomannus,  in 
whose  reign  Jaddua  was  high-priest.  For  the  text,  bringing 
down  the  reckoning  through  the  succession  of  several  high- 
priests,  terminates  the  whole  in  the  days  of  Jaddua,  and  the 
reign  of  Darius  the  Persian,  which  plainly  makes  them  con- 
temporaries ;  and  therefore  Darius  the  Persian,  in  that  text, 
could  be  none  other  than  Darius  Codomannus,  because  no 
other  Darius  but  he  was  king  of  Persia,  while  Jaddua  was 
high-priest  at  Jerusalem.  And,  if  so,  it  must  be  in  the  reign 
of  this  Darius,  at  the  soonest,  that  this  was  written,  and  conse- 
quently, Nehemiah,  the  writer  of  it,  must  then  be  living.  And 
this  brings  home  the  objection  upon  your  lordship's  hypothe- 
sis, because,  according  to  it,  he  must  have  then  been,  at  least, 
one  hundred  and  forty  years  old,  which  is  very  improbable. 
For,  if  it  were  in  the  20th  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  that 
he  came  to  Jerusalem,  with  a  commission  to  rebuild  that 
city,  and  be  governor  of  it,  we  cannot  suppose  him  then  to 
have  been  less  than  thirty  years  old  ;  for  a  lesser  age  would- 
be  too  early  for  such  a  trust.     After  this,  Artaxerxes  reigned 


63  THE  author's  life. 

21  years;  after  him,  Darius  Nothus  19  years;  after  him, 
Artaxerxes  Mnemon  46  years  ;  after  him,  Ochus  21  years ; 
and  then,  to  the  first  year  of  Darius  Codomanus,  were  three 
years  more;  all  which,  put  together,  make  140  years. 

2dly,  The  like  objection  will  also  lie  from  the  age  of  San- 
ballat,  the  Horonite  ;  for,  when  Nehemiah  came  to  execute 
his  commission  for  the  rebuilding  of  Jerusalem,  he  found 
him  a  governor  in  those  parts,  under  the  king  of  Persia, 
(whether  it  were  of  Samaria,  or  of  some  other  petty  pro- 
vince, as  your  lordship  says,  is  not  material  to  our  present 
purpose)  and,  to  qualify  him  for  such  a  trust,  he  must  then 
have  been,  at  least,  thirty  years  old.  And  therefore,  if  it 
were  in  the  twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  that 
Nehemiah  found  him  thus  intrusted,  since  he  died  not  (as 
Josephus  tells  us)  till  the  last  year  of  Darius  Codomannus, 
he  must  then  have  been,  at  his  death,  143  years  old,  which 
age  in  him,  is  much  more  improbable  than  the  other  in  Ne- 
hemiah. An  extraordinary  blessing  on  that  good  man  might 
be  alleged  for  such  an  extraordinary  age  in  him,  which  can- 
not be  said  of  the  other.  Each  of  these  instances,  apart, 
look  very  improbable,  but  coming  together,  are  much  more 
so,  and  therefore  must  be  a  very  strong  argument  against  that 
hypothesis  that  infers  them.  1  know  some,  to  solve  this 
difficulty,  make  two  Sanballats  ;  the  one  named  in  Scripture, 
who  is  there  said  to  have  married  his  daughter  to  one  of  the 
sons  of  Joiada,  which  they  will  have  to  be  that  Jesus,  who 
■was  slain  by  his  brother  Johanan  in  the  temple.  Joseph. 
Antiq.  xi.  7,  and  the  other,  the  Sanballat  named  by  Josephus, 
xi.  7,  8,  who  married  his  daughter  to  Manasseh,  the  brother 
of  Jaddua,  and  built  for  him  the  temple  at  mount  Gerizim. 
But,  where  the  name  is  the  same,  the  character  of  a  gover- 
nor in  the  neighbourhood  ol  Judea  the  same,  and  the  cir- 
cumstance of  marrying  a  daughter  to  a  son  of  an  high-priest 
the  same,  it  is  hard  to  suppose  two  different  persons ;  and 
scarce  any  one,  that  thoroughly  considers  it,  can  come  into 
this  supposition.  Your  lordship,  indeed,  mends  it  in  one 
particular,  in  allowing  but  one  marriage  of  a  daughter  to  an 
high-priest's  son ;  for,  if  I  take  you  right,  you  suppose  the 
Sanballat,  who  would  have  hindered  Nehemiah  in  his  work, 
to  have  been  a  different  person  from  the  Sanballat,  who  was 
father-in-law  to  one  of  Joiada's  sons,  Neh.  xiii.  28.  That 
the  latter  only  was  the  governor  of  Samaria,  of  whom  Jose- 
phus speaks,  Antiq.  xi.  7,  8,  and  who  died  in  the  last  year  of 
Darius  Codomannus  ;  and  that  the  other  was  not  the  gover- 
nor of  Samaria,  but  of  some  other  petty  province,  in  the 
neighbourhood.  But,  however,  this  will  not  solve  the  diffi- 
culty.    For,  supposing  the  Sanballat.  Neh.  xiii.  to  be  differ- 


THE  author's  lifk.  63' 

fent  from  the  Sanballat,  Neh.  ii.  and  vi.  (which  I  must  say,  is 
hard  to  suppose,  since,  in  both  places,  he  is  called  Sanballat 
the  Horonite)  yet  this  marriage  must  have  been  in  the  twelfth 
year  of  Nehemiah's  government,  that  is,  according  to  your 
lordship's  hypothesis,  in  the  thirty-second  year  of  Artaxerxes 
Longimanus  ;  for  in  that  year  Nehemiah  went  into  Persia  to 
the  king,  and,  on  his  return,  found  this  irregular  marriage  to 
have  been  made,  and  therefore  chased  away  from  the  temple 
the  person  guilty  hereof.  Supposing  therefore,  this  son  of 
Joiada  (whom  Josephus  calls  Manasseh,  and  saith  he  was  his 
grandson)  to  have  been  twenty  years  old,  at  the  time  of  his 
marriage,  that  is,  in  the  thirty-second  year  of  Artaxerxes 
Longimanus,  he  must  have  been  at  his  father-in-law's  death, 
one  hundred  and  twenty-one  years  old,  though  this  was  but 
the  first  year  of  his  priesthood  at  mount  Gerizim  ;  and,  if  we 
suppose  the  father-in-law  to  be  twenty-two  years  older  than 
the  son-in-law,  there  will  be  the  same  age  of  Sanballat,  as  is 
above  objected,  against  this  hypothesis.  So  that  the  making 
of  the  Sanballat,  Neh.  ii.  and  vi.  and  the  Sanballat,  Neh. 
xiii.  to  be  two  distinct  persons,  leaves  us  just  where  we  were 
before  ;  and  the  objection  is  not  at  all  lessened  by  it,  but  is 
rather  made  the  stronger,  by  bringing  in  the  improbable  age 
of  Sanballat's  son-in-law  to  be  a  further  addition  to  it. 

Thus  far  1  have  laid  before  your  lordship  the  objections 
which,  I  conceive,  do  lie  against  your  fixing  the  decree  grant- 
ed Nehemiah  for  the  rebuilding  of  Jerusalem,  to  the  twen- 
tieth year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  ;  and  since  you  build 
your  whole  scheme  on  the  supposition,  that  this  was  that 
year,  I  think  it  must  be  your  business,  in  the  first  place,  to 
make  this  good,  and  to  clear  it  against  all  objections,  that  it 
must  be  the  twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  only, 
and  not  of  any  other  Artaxerxes,  that  Nehemiah  obtained  this 
decree.  Otherwise,  you  beg  your  principle,  and,  by  thus 
failing  in  your  foundation,  can  make  nothing  stand  which 
you  build  upon  it ;  for  you  begin  your  computation  of  the 
seventy  weeks,  from  that  year,  for  this  reason  wholly,  because 
you  suppose,  that  in  that  year  the  decree  was  granted. 
But,  if  that  was  not  the  year,  in  which  this  grant  was  made, 
but  it  was  the  twentieth  year  of  another  Artaxerxes,  then 
you  begin  the  computation  wrong,  and  if  so,  you  must  end  it 
wrong,  and  all  must  be  wrong,  that  you  do  about  it.  And 
therefore,  I  must  confess,  I  cannot  but  be  amazed  to  find  your 
lordship  saying,  that  this  is  none  of  your  business,  and  that 
it  is  foreign  to  the  matter  before  you  ;  for  it  seems  to  me,  to 
be  the  principle  on  which  all  depends,  and,  without  the  set- 
tling of  which,  every  thing  else  which  you  do  will  be  foreign, 
and  nothing  to  the  purpose. 


&4  <£HE    AUTHOR  6    LIFE. 

However,  I  must  acknowledge  your  lordship's  scheme  is 
preferable  to  all  others  that  have  been  offered  for  the  solution 
of  this  difficult  matter.  Scaliger's  scheme  hath  not  only  the 
same  objections  against  it,  from  the  age  Zerubbabel  and 
Joshua  must  be  of,  on  the  second  of  Darius  Nothus  (from 
whence  he  begins  his  computation  of  the  seventy  weeks) 
that  yours  seems  to  have,  from  the  age  of  Nehemiah  and 
Sanballat,  but  also  several  others.  For  he  doth  not  end  the 
prophecy  at  the  cutting  off  the  Messias,  but  at  the  destruction 
of  Jerusalem  ;  neither  doth  he  begin  it  from  a  decree  or 
commandment  to  rebuild  Jerusalem,  but  only  from  a  decree 
to  finish  the  rebuilding  of  the  temple  ;  and  further,  according 
to  that  scheme  there  will  be  a  very  unequal  and  unlikely 
distribution  of  the  succession  of  the  high-priest ;  for,  from 
the  ending  of  the  Babylonish  captivity  to  the  death  of  Alex- 
ander, there  were  these  six  high-priests,  succeeding  in  a 
direct  line  from  father  to  son,  Jeshua,  Joiachim,  Eliashib, 
Joiada,  Johanan,  and  Jaddua.  And,  if  it  were  in  the  twen- 
tieth year  of  Artaxerxes  Mnemon,  as  Scaligersaith,  that  Ne- 
hemiah had  the  grant  for  the  rebuilding  of  Jerusalem,  Eli- 
ashib must  at  that  time  have  been  high-priest,  for  he  is  said 
to  have  been  by  Nehemiah,  at  the  doing  of  that  work;  and, 
if  we  suppose  him  to  have  been  high-priest  from  the  begin- 
ning of  that  reign,  that  is,  for  twenty  years,  before  (for  he 
was  so  for  several  years  after,  as  appears  by  the  same  book  of 
Nehemiah)  then,  from  the  solution  of  the  Babylonish  capti- 
vity, to  the  first  of  Artaxerxes  Mnemon,  there  would  have 
been  but  two  high-priests,  i.  e.  Jeshua  and  Joiachim,  for  the 
space  of  one  hundred  and  thirty-two  years;  and  then,  from 
thence,  there  must  be  four  for  the  remaining  term  of  eighty- 
one  years,  to  the  death  of  Alexander ;  at  which  time,  accord- 
ing to  Josephus,  died  Jaddua  also.  There  is,  I  confess,  no 
ditficulty  in  a  succession  of  four  in  eighty-one  years ;  there 
are  many  instances  of  this  every  where  ;  but  that  there 
should  be  but  a  succession  of  two,  for  one  hundred  and 
thirty-two  years  in  the  high-priest's  office,  which  required 
the  age  of  thirty,  at  the  least,  in  the  person  to  be  admitted 
thereto,  is  not  so  probable,  because,  in  this  case,  each  must 
have  been,  at  least,  ninety-six  years  old  at  his  death,  and, 
probably,  much  more.  For,  it  is  much  more  likely,  that 
Jeshua  was  above  thirty  years  old  at  the  solution  of  the 
Babylonish  captivity  ;  but,  if  he  were  no  more,  it  is  very  un- 
likely, that,  dying  at  the  age  of  ninety,  he  should  then  have 
a  son  of  no  greater  age  than  thirty  to  succeed  him.  I  am 
the  longer  upon  this,  because  it  is  a  difficulty  upon  Scaliger's 
scheme,  that  I  have  not  seen  taken  notice  of  by  any  other, 
and  makes  much  for  your  lordship's  scheme  ;  for  according 


T.HE    author's    LU'E.  tJO 

to  tiiat,  this  difliculty  is  wholly  removed,  and  the  succession 
of  the  high-priests  will  fall  very  equal,  and  free  from  all  ex- 
ception. And,  it  is  to  be  observed,  that  the  years  of  their 
several  high-priesthoods,  as  set  down  in  the  Chronicon  Jllejs- 
andrirmm,  do  not  only  make  a  distribution  of  the  successions, 
which  is  free  from  all  such  exception,  but  also  do  exactly 
agree  with  Scripture,  according  to  your  lordship's  scheme  5 
but  cannot  be  so  according  to  that  of  Scajiger.  For  that 
Chronicon  makes  Eliashib  to  die  twenty-nine  years  before 
Scaliger's  scheme  brings  Nehemiah  to  Jerusalem,  but  to  have 
been  nine  years  in  the  priesthood,  at  the  time  of  his  coming 
thither,  according  to  your  lordship's  scheme  ;  and  I  look  ou 
the  Chronicon  Alexandrinum  to  have  given  us  the  truest  ac- 
count of  the  years  of  each  high-priest,  in  that  succession  of 
them,  which  I  have  mentioned,  and  to  be  the  best  clue 
whereby  we  may  be  safely  led  through  the  dark  history 
which  v%e  have  of  the  Jewish  slate  in  those  times. 

And,  therefore,  your  lordship's  scheme  thus  far  looking  fair- 
er than  any  other  that  hath  been  offered,  1  could  wish  you 
would  apply  yourself  to  clear  it  of  the  difficulties  above 
mentioned  ;  for,  were  that  done,  it  would  stand  for  ever. 
And  this  prophecy  of  the  time  of  the  coming  of  the  Messias 
would  appear  to  be  so  thoroughly  fulfilled,  in  the  coming  ot* 
our  Saviour,  and  the  argument  for  his  being  the  person  pro- 
mised herein,  would  be  made  so  clear  and  irrefragable,  that 
it  would  be  no  longer  capable  of  any  contradiction,  either 
from  the  Jews,  or  aiiy  other  adversaries  of  our  holy  Chris- 
tian religion.  And  tlierefore  I  heartily  wish  your  lordship 
would  be  pleased  speedily  to  publish  your  scheme,  and  to 
take  care  to  clear  it  from  the  difliculties  above  mentioned.  If 
you  would  be  pleased  to  give  me  leave  to  propose,  what  I 
am  thoroughly  persuaded  is  the  truthof  the  matter,  and  what 
I  think  would  fully  solve  the  whole,  I  would  offer  it  as 
followeth  : 

1st.  That  those  passages,  which  name  Jaddua  in  the  book 
of  Nehemiah,  were  all  inserted  after  the  book  was  written, 
by  those  who  received  it  into  the  Jewish  canon,  most  likely 
about  the  time  of  the  high-priest  Simon  the  Just,  when  that 
canon  was  fully  finished.  The  whole  that  hath  been  said 
by  others  on  this  head,  your  lordship  well  knows,  and,  I 
doubt  not,  can  say  a  great  deal  more  upon  it,  fully  to  clear 
the  thing,  and  make  it  thoroughly  appear  to  be  the  truth,  as 
I  am  fully  persuaded  it  is ;  and,  when  this  is  cleared,  all  that 
is  said  in  the  first  objection  will  be  cleared  also. 

2d.  As  to  the  other  difficulty,  which  is  about  the  age  of 
Sanballat,  it  all  arising  from  the  inconsistency,  which  is  be- 
tween the  Scripture  account,  and  Josephus's  account  of  tlw 

Von.  I.  r» 


titnc  ill  Mliich  this  man  lived,  if  you  give  up  the  profane 
writer  to  the  sacred,  (as  must  always  be  done,  where  they 
cannot  consist  together)  there  is  an  end  of  this  matter.  And 
Ihat  Josephus,  in  his  bringing  down  the  time  of  Sanballat  to 
tlie  reign  of  Alexander  the  Great,  was  wholly  out,  is  no  hard 
mattter  to  prove.  For  it  is  plain  to  me,  he  follows  herein 
the  tradition  of  his  countrymen  the  Jews  ;  whose  account 
concerning  the  Persian  monarchy  is  altogether  false  and  ab- 
surd ;  for  they  make  the  whole  continuance  of  it,  from  the 
first  of  Cyrus  to  the  first  of  Alexander,  to  be  no  more  than 
iifty-two  years  :  that  the  Darius,  in  whom  it  ended,  was  the 
13arius  wlipm  we  call  Darius  Hydaspes  ;  that  he  was  the  sou 
of  Esther  by  Cambyses,  whom  they  make  to  be  the  Aha- 
suerus  of  the  book  of  Esther ;  that  this  Darius  was  called 
also  Artaxerxes  (which  they  will  have  to  be  the  common 
name  of  the  Persian  kings,  as  Pharaoh  was  of  the  Egyptian,) 
and  that  it  was  in  the  twentieth  year  of  his  reign  that  Ne- 
hemiah  rebuilt  Jerusalem  ;  and  that,  sixteen  years  after,  was 
the  end  of  that  empire,  and  the  beginning  of  the  Macedonian. 
And,  although  Josephus,  who  had  looked  into  the  Greek 
historians,  could  not  swallow  all  this  absurd  stuff,  yet  it  seems 
plain  to  me,  he  came  into  so  much  of  it,  as  was  the  cause  of 
his  error  in  this  matter  of  Sanballat.  For,  although  he  doth 
not  make  Cambyses  to  be  the  Ahasuerus  of  Esther,  but 
carries  down  that  story  to  the  time  of  Artaxerxes  Longima- 
nus,  yet  it  is  clear  to  me,  he  makes  the  Darius,  that  next 
succeeds,  to  be  the  Darius  whom  Alexander  conquered  ;  for 
he  is  the  last  he  makes  any  mention  of,  in  the  succession  of 
the  Persian  kings.  After  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  he  imme- 
diately names  Darius,  and,  after  him,  none  other.  And  ac- 
tordiijg  to  Ihis  account,  the  Sanballat  of  the  twentieth  of 
Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  and  the  Sanballat  in  the  time  of  the 
last  Darius,  may,  very  consistently,  be  made  the  same  man  ; 
for  there  will  be,  according  to  this  reckoning,  very  few  years 
between  them.  The  truth  of  tlie  matter  I  take  to  have 
been  thus  :  the  Sanballat  who  would  have  hindered  the  re- 
building of  Jerusalem,  was  the  same  who  is  said,  Neh,  xiii. 
28,  to  have  been  father-in-law  to  one  of  the  sons  of  Joiada 
the  high-priest ;  that  Manasseh,  who  was  the  son-in-law,  was 
the  immediate  son  of  Joiada,  as  the  Scripture  saith,  and  not 
the  grandson,  as  Josephus  saith  ;  that  this  marriage  was  made, 
while  Nehemiah,in  the  twelfth  year  of  his  government  (which 
was  the  thirty-second  of  Artaxerxes)  was  gone  into  Persia  to 
the  king ;  and  that,  for  this  reason,  on  his  return,  he  drove 
him  away  from  officiating  any  longer  in  the  temple  ;  whereon 
he,  retiring  to  Samaria,  about  five  or  six  years  after,  obtained 
leave,  by  Sanballafs  interest  at  the  Persian  court,  to  build 


THE  author's  life.  67 

the  temple  on  mount  Gerizim ;  which  the  Jewish  chronology 
running  into  the  time  of  Alexander,  Josephus  for  that  reason 
sets  it  down  as  done  in  the  time  of  Alexander ;  and  this,  1 
I  verily  believe,  was  the  whole  authority  he  had  for  it.  Arid, 
that  he  should  make  such  a  mistake  in  those  times,  is  no 
wonder,  since  there  may  be  others  observed  in  him,  of  the 
same  times,  altogether  as  gross,  of  which  your  lordship  takes 
notice  in  your  paper. 

I  beg  your  lordship's  pardon,  that  1  have  transgressed  so 
long  upon  your  patience  with  this  tedious  paper.  1  humbly 
offer  it  to  your  consideration  :  and  1  am,  my  lord,  your  most 
dutiful  humble  servant, 

Humphrey  Prideaux. 

P.S.  And,  I  beg  leave  further  to  observe  to  your  lordship, 
that,  whekeas  Josephus  placeth  the  ceasing  of  the  spirit  ot 
prophecy  in  the  last  year  of  that  Artaxerxes,  from  whom, 
according  to  your  lordship's  scheme,  Ezra  and  Nehemiah  had 
their  commission  ;  all  the  Jewish  writers  do  so  too,  tellins  us. 
that  Ezra,  Haggai,  Zachary,  and  Malachi,  all  departed  out 
of  this  life  on  that  year;  and  that  the  spirit  of  prophecy  de- 
parted with  them.  But  they  make  that  year  to  be  the  last 
of  the  Persian  monarchy,  and  the  very  same  in  which  Alex- 
ander came  to  Jerusalem,  and  Sanballat  obtained  tiiat  grant 
for  a  temple  on  mount  Gerizim,  which  Josephus  tells  us  of. 
And  therefore  it  is  plain  to  me,  that  Josephus,  in  bringing 
down  this  matter  of  Sanballat  as  low  as  the  time  of  Alex- 
ander, followed  the  false  chronology  of  his  countrymen,  th(; 
Jews,  and  not  that  true  computation  which  your  lordship 
reckons  by.  ^ 

TO    FRAXCIS    GWYNX,     ESQ.    AT    FuKD    ABBEV,     NEAR 
CRUCKKRX. 

Sir,  1  have  received  the  letter  you  honoured  me  with  ;  and 
you  should  sooner  have  received  "an  answer  to  it,  had  1  been 
in  a  condition  to  give  it ;  for  I  am  so  broken  by  age  and  in- 
iirmity,  that  I  have  few  intervals  of  health  to  enable  me  to 
do  any  thing. 

I  have,  indeed,  often  said,  that  there  is  wanting  a  good 
history  of  the  East,  from  the  time  of  Mahomet;,  and  that 
there  are  sufficient  materials  to  be  had  for  it,  from  the  wri- 
tings of  the  Arabs,  of  which  there  is  a  great  treasury  at  Ox- 
ford, especially  since  the  addition  of  Dr.  Pocock's  MSS. 
But  I  could  not  say  much  of  the  i\Iamalucs,of  whom  1  know 
no  author  that  has  written  in  particular  ;  neither  did  they 
deserve  that  anv  should. 


tig  TMIi  ^utjior's    LirfT. 

For  they  wore  a  buse  soil  of  people  ;  a  Colliivies  ofslavcs". 
thesrnmof  ail  (he  East.  who.  Ijaviiit^  treacherously  destroyed 
the*  .lobid.p,  their  masters,  rciyried  in  their  stead  ;  and,  bating 
that  (liey  finislied  the  expulsion  of  the  Avcstcrn  Christians 
out  of  the  J'>ast,  (where  they  l)arbarously  destroyed  Tripoli. 
Antioch,  and  several  otiier  cities)  they  scarce  did  any  thing 
worthy  to  be  recorded  in  history.  The  beginning  of  their 
empire  was,  A.  D.  1250,  and  it  ended  in  the  year  1517, 
which  was  the  eighth  year  of  the  reign  of  our  king  Henry 
the  Eighth;  so  that  their  empire,  in  Egypt,  lasted  two  hun- 
dred and  sixty-seven  years,  during  which  time  they  had  a 
succession  of  above  filty  reigns,  in  which  the  major  part  ot* 
their  kings  ascended  the  throne  by  the  murder  or  deposi- 
tion of  their  predecessors.  So  base  and  barbarous  a  people 
scarce  deserve  to  be  spoken  of,  and  so  quick  a  succession 
could  not  allow  tinfie  enough  for  any  of  them  to  do  any  great 
matters.  They  gloried  in  having  been  slaves,  and  therefore 
tailed  themselves  by  a  name  which  expressed  as  much;  for 
Mamaluc,  in  Arabic,  signifies  a  slave;  and,  for  the  further 
expression  hereof,  it  was  an  usage  among  them  to  take  the 
names  of  all  the  masters  they  served,  by  way  of  addition  to 
that  which  was  properly  their  own.t 

But  what  you  mistook  me  to  have  said  of  the  Mamalucs 
is  true  of  the  East  in  general ;  for  there  are  many  good  his- 
tories of  the  affairs  thereof,  from  the  time  of  Mahomet,  in 
the  Abraham  and  Persian  languages.  And  the  many  revolu- 
tions that  happened  there,  from  the  time  aforesaid,  and  the 
many  considerable  events  which  were  produced  in  the  effect- 
ing of  them,  afTord  suflicient  materials  for  a  very  good  his- 
tory of  those  parts,  which  we  here  wholly  want.  For,  fron^ 
the  time  of  AJahomet,  there  were  four  large  empires  erected 
in  the  East,  in  succession  one  of  another,  whose  transactions 
deserve  recording,  as  well  as  those  of  the  Greeks  or  Romans. 

The  first  of  these  empires  was  that  of  the  Saracens,  which 
in  eighty  years  extended  itself  as  largely  as  that  of  the  Ro- 
mans did  in  eight  hundred  ;  for  it  took  in  India,  Fersia,  Ar- 
menia, Mesopotamia,  Syria.  Palestine,  7\rabia,  Egypt,  Spain, 
and  all  the  coast  of  Africa,  westward,  as  far  as  the  Atlantic 
Ocean.  It  began  in  the  year  622,  and,  after  having  lasted 
under  the  caliphs  of  Bagdat  three  hundred  and  fourteen 
years,  it  expired  all  at  once,  in  the  year  936.  For,  in  that 
year,  all  the  governors  of  provinces  conspiring  together,  each 
declared  himself  sovereign  in  his  respective  government,  and 
left  the  caliph  only  Bagdat,  with  the  narrow  territories  of  that 
eity,  for  his  support;  where  he  and  his  successors  conlin'v- 

*  See  Dr.  Prideaux's  Life  of  Mahomet,  p.  104. 

i  See  Marsat  llhu  of  fnmerlan*;,  \\h.  \\u.  inprincifi. 


THE    author's    life.  C9 

■  d  for  several  ages  after  as  sacred  persons,  being,  as  it  were, 
the  popes  of  the  Mahometan  sect. 

The  empire  of  the  Saracens  being  weakened  by  this  di- 
vision of  its  dominions,  and  having  also  suffered  many  con- 
vulsions from  the  mutual  hostihties  which  the  successors  of 
them  that  divided  it  made  upon  each  other,  the  *SeiJukian 
Turks,  from  the  northern  parts  of  Tartary,  taking  the  ad- 
vantage thereof,  A.  D.  1037,  made  a  terrible  invasion  upon 
it.  One  part  of  them,  under  the  leading  of  Togrul-Beg 
(whom  the  western  writers  call  Tangrolonix)  seized  on  all 
that  lies  between  the  Indus  and  the  Euphrates  ;  and  the  other 
part  of  them  passing  farther,  under  the  command  of  Koslu- 
mish,  seized  the  Lesser  Asia,  and  there  founded  the  kingdom 
of  Iconium,  where  his  posterity,  for  several  descents,  till 
Aladin,  the  last  of  them,  dying  without  issue,  Othman,  from 
being  his  mercenary,  became  his  successor;  and,  in  the}  ear 
1300,  seized  his  kingdom,  and  thereon  founded  the  Turkish 
empire  that  is  now  in  being;  of  which  Knowles  hath  given 
us  a  very  good  history.  Togrul-Beg,  having  fixed  his  empire 
in  Persia  and  Assyria,  and  the  neighbouring  countries,  he 
and  his  descendants  there  reigned  for  several  successions, 
till  they  were  suppressed  by  Jingiz-Can,  king  of  the  ancient 
Moguls,  who  inhabited  that  part  of  Tartary  which  lies  next 
to  the  wall  of  China. 

For  this  mighty  prince  having  begun  his  reign  A.  D. 
1202,  formed  the  largest  empire  that  ever  was  in  the  world, 
for  it  contained  all  China  and  India,  and  extended  westward, 
on  the  side  of  the  north,  through  all  Tartaria,  Russia,  Poland, 
and  Hungary,  as  far  as  the  Baltic,  the  Oder,  and  the  Adri- 
atic ;  and  on  the  side  of  the  south,  as  far  as  the  Euphrates 
and  the  Euxine  sea  ;  which  was  more  tlian  double  the  extent 
of  that  of  Alexander,  or  of  that  of  the  Romans.  And, 
therefore,  by  reason  of  ihe  largeness  of  it,  whenever  a  gene- 
ral council  was  called,  two  years  were  allowed  for  their  meet- 
ing, the  remote  distance  of  some  of  the  provinces  requiring 
that  time  for  their  coming  together.  This  empire  continued 
in  the  posterity  of  Jingiz-Can  through  twelve  descents,  till 
the  death  of  Bahadur-Can,  the  last  of  them  ;  when  it  had 
the  same  end  with  that  of  the  Saracens.  For,  on  the  death 
of  that  prince,  which  happened  in  the  year  1335,  the  gover- 
nors of  provinces,  by  a  general  conspiracy,  usurped  in  each 
of  them  the  sovereignty  to  themselves,  and  thereby  extin- 
guished this  empire  all  at  once ;  and,  we  may  reasonably 
expect,  that  the  empire  of  the  Othmans  will,  some  time  or 
other,  have  the  same  fate.     It  hath  been  several  times  at- 

*  f?ee  Mr.  Petis  <^e  la  Croix  Hist.  Gengliiscan.book  ii.  chap.  1. 


70  THE    author's    life. 

tempted  by  some  of  the  bashaws  ;  but  it  hath  hitherto  failed 
of  success  for  want  of  the  general  concurrence  of  the  rest. 
One  Mr.  Petis  de  la  Croix*  hath  published,  in  French,  the 
history  of  Jingiz-Can,  with  an  account  of  his  empire,  and  the 
succession  of  the  kings  of  his  race  that  governed  it  after 
him  ;  in  the  compiling  of  which  work,  he  tells  us,  he  employ- 
ed ten  years ;  so  that,  it  may  be  hoped,  he  hath  gathered  to- 
gether all  the  materials  that  are  proper  for  the  same  ;  but 
whether  he  has  done  so  1  cannot  say,  having  never  seen  the 
book. 

Thirty-three  years  after  the  extinction  of  this  empire  of 
the  Moguls,  there  was  raised  out  of  its  ruins  another  empire 
of  the  Moguls,  who,  to  distinguish  them  from  the  other,  are 
called  the  latter  Moguls.  The  founder  of  this  empire  was 
the  famous  Tamerlane,  by  the  western  writers,  who  begin- 
ning his  reign  in  the  year  1.368,  continued  in  it  thirty-six 
years,  that  is,  till  the  year  1 404,  when  he  died  ;  during  which 
time  he  overrun  all  the  eastern  part  of  the  world  with  pro- 
digious success  of  victory  ;  whereby  he  subjugated  to  him 
all  Tartaria,  China,  India,  Persia,  and  all  else,  westward,  as 
far  as  the  Archipelago.  At  his  death,  he  divided  his  empire 
among  his  sons;  the  posterity  of  him  that  had  India  for  his 
part  of  the  legacy,  still  reign  there,  unless  the  many  revolu- 
tions and  convulsions  of  government,  which  have  happened 
there  since  the  death  of  Aurang  Zeb,  have  by  this  time  ex- 
tinguished it.  Of  this  race  of  the  Mogul  kings  in  India,  one 
Seignior  Monuchi,  a  Venetian,  who  had  been  physician  in 
the  court  of  Aurang  Zeb  for  near  forty  years,  hath  written  a 
very  good  history:  it  is  published  in  French  and  English; 
which  is  very  well  worth  the  perusal.  He  was  lately  alive 
at  St.  Thomas,  a  town  of  the  Portuguese,  within  seven 
miles  of  our  establishment  of  Fort  St.  George,  in  the  coast 
of  India. 

The  rise  and  fall  of  these  four  empires,  and  the  several 
remarkable  matters  and  facts  transacted  in  them  while  they 
stood,  cannot  but  aflford  a  very  fitting  and  plentiful  subject  for 
an  excellent  history  ;  and  there  are  sufficient  materials  for  it 
in  the  writings  of  the  East,  were  they  carefully  and  judi- 
ciously put  together.  As  to  the  authors  of  this  sort,  which 
are  in  the  public  library  of  Oxford,  there  is  a  full  account 
given  of  them  in  the  large  catalogue  of  the  MSB.  of  England, 
printed  at  Oxford,  about  twenty-five  years  since.  Among 
these,  are  the  two  famous  historians  of  the  East,!  Abul-Feda 
and  Al  Jannabius,  which  are  now  printing  at  Oxford,  in  Ara- 

*  See  Collier.  Append.  Genghiskan. 

t  See  Dr.  Prideaux's  Life  of  Mahomet. — His  Account  of  Authors,  4to.  Edit 
p.  153,  160. — Churchills  Collect,  of  V^oyages,  vol.  i.  Introiluct.  Ixxix. 


THE   author's    life.  71 

bio  and  Latin,  by  Mr.  Gagnier,  a  French  gentleman,  well 
skilled  in  this  kind  of  learning.  But,  if  my  lord  Pembroke 
(to  whom  my  most  humble  duty)  desires  further  to  be  inform- 
ed of  what  the  East  can  afford  us  of  this  nature,  I  beg  leave 
to  recommend  to  him  Mr.  Herbelot's  Bihliotheca  Orientalis, 
a  book  written  in  French  some  years  since  ;  wherein  he 
gives  account  of  all  the  Eastern  writers  that  fell  within  his 
knowledge,  whether  historical,  philosophical,  or  of  any  other 
subject.  Since  that,  another  Bihliotheca  of  the  Eastern 
writers  hath  been  projected  at  Rome,  which  pretends  to 
supply  the  defects  of  Herbelot,  and  give  us  an  additional 
account  of  many  other  Eastern  writers,  more  than  are  to  be 
found  in  that  author.  It  is  designed  to  be  in  three  volumes 
in  folio,  of  which,  the  first  volume,  1  hear,  is  already  pub- 
lished. 

As  to  Mr.  Jones,  whom  my  lord  Pembroke  makes  mention 
of,  I  do  not  know  the  gentleman,  neither  have  I  ever  heard 
of  him.  To  make  him  adequate  to  it,  requires  a  thorough 
skill  in  the  Arabic  language,  which  cannot,  without  long  and 
sedulous  application,  be  attained  unto ;  and  it  adds  to  the 
difficulty,  that  most  of  the  books,  to  be  made  use  of  in  this 
matter,  lie  in  manuscript,  which  cannot  be  easily  come  at,  or 
easily  read.  For  I  know  but  of  three  Arabic  historians,  that 
are  in  print,  *EImacinus,  Abul-Pharagius,  and  Eutychius  ; 
the  first,  published  by  Herpenius,  and  the  other  two  by  Dr. 
Pocock :  but  these  are  only  jejune  epitomes,  containing  no 
more  than  the  bare  bones  of  the  Oriental  history :  the  full 
substance  of  it,  to  make  it  a  perfect  body,  is  to  be  sought 
from  other  books. 

The  greatest  difficulty,  in  compiling  such  an  history, 
would  be  the  reconciling  the  Arabic  and  Byzantine  writers, 
who  often  give  us  accounts  of  matters,  which  are  inconsistent 
with  each  other:  and  the  same  is  to  be  said  of  the  Latin 
writers  that  treat  of  the  holy  war,  they  often  giving  narra- 
tives of  it,  quite  different  from  the  Arabic  ;  for  both  sides 
frequently  choose  to  gratify  their  hatred  and  bitter  aversion 
against  each  other,  by  reason  of  their  different  religions, 
rather  than  give  us  the  naked  truth  of  the  facts  they  write 
of.  The  Arabic  writers,  it  must  be  confessed,  are  more  ex- 
act in  their  chronology  than  the  Byzantine,  and,  in  some 
other  particulars,  seem  to  be  more  impartial,  and  to  come 
nearer  to  the  truth  than  the  other. 

In  order  to  understand  the  Oriental  history,  and  the  wri- 
ters of  it,  from  the  time  of  Mahomet,  a  new  Oriental  geogra- 

"  See  the  Life  of  Mahomet,  ubi  supra,  p.  153,  164,  165.  Seld.  Tom.  11.  p. 
410 — Gen.  Pref.  xvi.— vol.  i,  p.  1069,  1702,  1703,  1884.— ibid.  1356,  1703, 
1866, 


72  THE    AUTHOR'S    LIFE. 

phy  is  necessary ;  for  the  names  of  the  countries  and  cities 
in  the  East,  which  the  Romans  and  Greeks  called  them  by, 
are  now  altogether  unknown  in  the  East.  Abul-Feda  is  as 
famous  for  his  geography  as  for  his  history  :  were  that  print- 
ed with  a  good  version,  it  would  answer  the  matter:  this 
has  been  several  times  attempted,  but  hitherto  without  suc- 
cess. 

About  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  after  Mahomet,  the 
Saracens,  from  the  Greek  books  (which,  in  their  several  in- 
roads upon  the  Grecian  empire,  they  had  plundered  out  of 
the  Grecian  libraries)  having  the  learning  of  the  Greeks 
among  them,  and  it  having  flourished  there  for  four  hundred 
years  after  the  Arabic  writers,  are,  from  that  time,  as  full  of 
their  accounts  of  their  famous  scholars,  as  they  are  of  their 
famous  warriors,  and  equally  record  what  is  remarkable  of 
both.  If  the  history  of  the  East,  here  proposed  to  be  made, 
should  follow  the  same  method,  and  equally  give  us  an  ac- 
count of  the  progress  of  their  learning,  as  well  as  of  their 
arms,  it  would  render  the  work  the  more  acceptable  to  the 
learned  world. 

Thus  far  have  I  endeavoured  to  answer  your  letter,  as  well 
as  my  shattered  head  would  give  me  leave  to  dictate  it.  It 
will  very  much  please  me,  if  it  prove  to  your  satisfaction  ,: 
for  1  am,  Sir,  your  most  faithful  humble  servant, 

H.  Prideaux. 
Norwich,  Feb.  5,  1721-2. 


FKKFACK 


The  calamitous  distemper  of  the  stone,  and  the  unfortunate 
management  1  fell  under,  after  being  cut  for  it,  having  driven 
me  out  of  the  pulpit,  in  wholly  disabling  rae  for  that  duty  of 
my  profession,  that  I  might  not  be  altogether  useless,  I  under- 
took this  work,  hoping  that  the  clearing  of  the  sacred  history 
by  the  profane,  the  connecting  of  the  Old  Testament  with 
the  New,  by  an  account  of  the  times  intervening,  and  the 
explaining  of  the  prophecies  that  were  fulfilled  in  them, 
might  be  of  great  use  to  many.  What  is  now  published  is 
only  the  first  part  of  my  design.  If  God  gives  life,  the  other 
will  soon  after  follow  ;  but  if  it  should  please  him,  who  is  the 
Disposer  of  all  things,  that  it  happen  otherwise,  yet  this 
History,  being  brought  down  to  the  times  when  the  canon 
of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  was  finished,  it  may  of  itself  be 
reckoned  a  complete  work  :  for  it  may  serve  as  an  epilogue 
to  (he  Old  Testament,  in  the  same  manner  as  what  after  is  to 
follow,  will  be  a  prologue  to  the  New. 

Chronology  and  geography  being  necessary  helps  to  his- 
tory, and  good  chronological  tables  being  most  useful  for  the 
one,  as  good  maps  are  for  the  other  ;  I  have  taken  full  care 
of  the  former,  not  only  by  adding  such  tables  in  the  conclu- 
sion of  the  work,  as  may  answer  this  end,  but  also  by  digest-, 
ing  the  whole  into  the  form  of  annals  under  the  years  before 
Christ,  and  the  years  of  the  kings  that  then  reigned  over 
Judea  ;  both  which  are  added  in  the  margin  at  the  beginning 
of  every  year,  in  which  the  actions  happened  that  are  rela- 
ted. And  as  to  the  latter,  since  Dr.  Wells,  Cellarius,  and 
Reland  have  sufficiently  provided  for  it,  both  by  good  maps 
of  the  countries  this  history  relates  to,  and  also  by  accurate 
descriptions  of  them,  I  need  do  no  more  than  refer  the  reader 
to  what  they  have  already  done  in  this  matter.  What  Dr. 
Wells  hath  done  herein,  being  written  in  English,  will  best 
serve  the  English  reader;  but  they  that  are  also  skilled  in 
the  Latin  tongue  may  moreover  consult  the  other  two. 

In  the  annals,  I  have  made  use  of  no  other  era  but  that 
of  the  years  before  Christ,  reckoning  it  backward  from  the 
vulgar  era  of  Christ's  incarnation,  and  not  from  the  true  time 
of  it.  For  learned  men  are  not  all  agreed  in  the  fixing  of 
the   true  time   of  Christ's   incarnation,  some  placing  it  two 

Vol.  T.  10 


74  rREFACE. 

vcars,  and  some  four  j'cars,  before  the  vulgar  era.  But  wlicre 
the  vulvar  era  begins,  all  know  that  use  it ;  and  therefore  the 
reckoning  of  the  years  before  Christ  backward  from  thence, 
makes  ita  fixed  and  certain  era.  The  difference  that  isbetween 
the  true  year  of  our  Saviour's  incarnation,  and  that  of  the 
vulgar  era  of  it,  proceeded  from  hence,  that  it  was  not  till  the 
five  hundred  and  twenty-seventh  year  of  that  era,  that  it  was 
first  brought  into  use.  *Dionysius  Exiguus,a  Scythian  by  birth, 
and  then  a  Roman  abbot,  was  the  first  author  of  it ;  and  13eda, 
our  countryman,  taking  it  from  him,  used  it  in  all  his  writings  ; 
and  the  recommendation  which  he  gave  it  thereby,  hath  made 
it  of  common  use  among  Christians  ever  since,  especially  in 
these  western  parts.  Had  all  Christians  calculated  their  time 
by  it  from  the  beginning  of  the  church  of  Christ  (as  it  could 
be  wished  they  had,)  there  could  then  have  been  no  mistake 
in  it.  But  it  being  five  hundred  and  twenty-seven  years 
after  Christ's  incarnation,  before  this  era  of  it  was  ever  used, 
no  wonder,  that  after  so  great  a  distance  of  time,  a  mis- 
take was  made  in  the  fixing  of  ihe  first  year  of  it. 

The  era  from  the  creation  of  the  world  is  of  very  common 
use  in  chronology  ;  but  this  I  have  rejected,  because  of  the 
uncertainty  of  it,  most  chronologers  following  different  opi- 
nions herein,  some  reckoning  the  time  of  the  creation  sooner, 
and  some  later,  and  scarce  any  two  agreeing  in  the  same 
year  for  it. 

The  Julian  period  is  indeed  a  certain  measure  of  time, 
"but  its  certainty  depends  upon  a  reckoning  backward,  in  the 
same  manner  as  that  of  the  era  before  Christ.  For  it  being 
a  period  of  seven  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighty  Julian 
years,  made  out  of  the  three  cycles  of  the  sun,  moon,  and 
indiction,  multiplied  into  each  other;  and  the  first  year  of 
it  being  that  in  which  all  these  three  cycles  of  the  sun  be- 
gin together,  this  first  year  can  be  no  otherwise  fixed,  than 
by  computing  backward  from  the  present  numbers  of  those 
cycles  through  all  the  different  combinations  of  them,  till  we 
come  to  that  year,  in  which  the  first  year  of  every  one  of 
them  meet  together  ;  which  carries  up  the  reckoning  several 
hundred  years  before  the  creation,  and  fixeth  the  beginning 
of  the  period  in  an  imaginary  point  of  time  before  time  was. 
And  therefore,  although  from  that  beginning  it  computes 
downward,  yet  the  whole  of  its  certainty  is  by  a  backward 
reckoning  from  the  present  years  of  those  cycles :  for,  ac- 
cording as  they  are,  all  must  be  reckoned  upward  even  to 

*  See  Scaligcr,  Calvisius,  and  other  chrouologers,  in  those  parts  of  their 
works,  where  tliey  write  of  the  vulgar  era  of  Christ.  And  see  also  Du  Pin's 
History  of  Ecclesiastical  writers,  cent.  6,  p.  42:  and  Dr.  Cave's  Historia 
Literaria,  p.  405. 


PREFACE.  75 

the  beginning  of  the  period.  So  that,  although  in  appear- 
ance it  reckons  downward,  yet  in  reaHty  it  is  only  a  backward 
computation,  to  tell  us  how  many  years  since  any  thing  was 
done  from  the  present  year.  For  in  the  numbers  of  the 
three  cycles  of  the  present  year,  it  hath  a  real  and  fixed 
foundation  for  an  upward  reckoning,  and  so  in  any  other  year, 
in  which  the  said  numbers  are  known  ;  whereas  it  hath  none 
at  all  for  a  downward  reckoning,  but  what  is  in  the  imagina- 
tion only.  And  therefore,  this  being  the  true  and  real  use 
of  the  Julian  period,  the  era  before  Christ  for  the  times  I 
treat  of,  serves  all  the  purposes  of  chronology  altogether  as 
well,  if  not  much  better.  For,  adding  the  years  before 
Christ,  to  those  since  Christ,  according  to  the  vulgar  era,  it 
immediately  tells  us  how  many  years  since  any  action  before 
the  time  of  Christ  was  done,  and  the  Julian  period  can  do 
no  more  ;  and  indeed  it  cannot  do  thus  much  but  by  reduc- 
tion, whereas  it  is  done  the  other  way  directly,  immediately, 
and  at  first  sight.  However,  in  the  tables  I  have  put  the  Ju- 
lian period,  and  have  reduced  to  it  not  only  the  years  before 
Christ,  but  also  the  years  of  the  princes  reigning  in  Judea, 
and  the  neighbouring  countries,  and  all  things  else  that  are 
treated  of  in  this  History;  and  hereby  the  Synchronisms,  or 
coincident  times  and  transactions  of  other  nations,  may  easily 
be  known. 

The  year  I  compute  by  in  the  annals  is  the  Julian  year, 
which  begins  from  the  first  of  January  ;  and  to  this  I  reduce 
all  the  actions  I  treat  of,  though  they  were  originally  reckon- 
ed by  other  forms.  The  ^Greeks,  before  the  time  of  Meto, 
began  their  year  from  the  winter  solstice,  and  after  from  that 
of  the  summer.  The  Egyptians,  Chaldeans,  and  ancient 
Persians,  reckoned  the  first  of  the  month  Thoth  to  be  always 
the  first  day  of  their  year,  which,  consisting  of  365  days, 
without  a  leap  year,t  it  began  every  fourth  year  one  day 
sooner  than  it  did  before  ;  and  so,  in  the  space  of  1460  years, 
its  beginning  was  carried  backward  through  the  whole  solar 
year.  The  Syrians  and  the  Phoenicians  began  their  year 
from  the  autumnal  equinox  ;  and  so  did  also  the  Hebrews, 
till  their  coming  up  out  of  the  land  of  Egypt.  But  that 
happening  in  the  month  of  Nisan,  in  commemoration  of 
this  deliverance,  they  afterward  began  their  year  fromj 
the  beginning  of  that  month,  which  usually  happened  about 
the   time  of  the  vernal  equinox  5  and  this  form   they  ever 

*  Vide  Scaligerum,  Petavium,  aliosque  chronologos,  in  eis  locis  ubi  de 
anno  Graecorum  agunt. 

t  So  it  was  in  the  time  of  the  last  Darius  ;  but  afterward  the  Persians 
compensated  for  the  loss  of  the  leap  year,  by  adding  an  intercalary  month 
of  30  days  every  13lh  year. 

t  Exod.  xii.  2. 


76  rUEFACE. 

after  made  use  of  in  the  calculating  of  the  times  of  their 
fasts  and  festivals,  and  all  other  ecclesiastical  times  and  con- 
cerns ;  but,  in  all  civil  matters,  as  contracts,  obligations,  and 
such  other  affairs,  which  were  of  a  secular  nature,  they  still 
made  use  of  the  old  form,  and  began  their  year  as  formerly, 
from  the  first  of  Tisri,  which  happened  about  the  time  of  the 
autumnal  equinox  :  and  from  hence  they  began*  all  their 
jubilees  and  sabbatical  years,  and  all  other  their  computa- 
tions of  civil  matters,  as  they  still  do  the  years  of  the  crea- 
tion of  the  world,  and  the  years  of  their  era  of  contracts; 
which  are  the  only  epochas  they  now  compute  past  times  by. 
Anciently!  the  form  of  the  year  which  they  made  use  of  was 
wholly  inartificial :  for  it  was  not  settled  by  any  astronomical 
rules  or  calculations,  but  was  made  up  of  lunar  months  set 
out  by  the  phasis  or  appearance  of  the  moon.  When  they 
saw  the  new  moon,  then  they  began  their  months,  which 
sometimes  consisted  of  twenty-nine  days,  and  sometimes  of 
thirty,  according  as  the  new  moon  did  sooner  or  later  ap- 
pear. The  reason  of  this  was,  because  the  synodical  course 
of  the  moon  (that  is,  from  new  moon  to  new  moon)  being 
twenty-nine  days  and  an  half,  the  half  day,  which  a  month  of 
twenty-nine  days  fell  short  of,  was  made  up  by  adding  it  to 
the  next  month,  which  made  it  consist  of  thirty  days  ;  so 
that  their  months  consisted  of  twenty-nine  days  and  thirty 
days  alternatively.  None  of  them  had  fewer  than  twenty- 
nine  days,  and  therefore  they  never  looked  for  the  new 
moon  before  the  night  following  the  twenty-ninth  day ;  and, 
if  they  then  saw  it,  the  next  day  was  the  first  day  of  the  fol- 
lowing month.  Neither  had  any  of  their  months  more  than 
thirty  days,  and  therefore  they  never  looked  for  the  new 
moon  after  the  night  following  the  thirtieth  day  ;  but  then,  if 
they  saw  it  not,  they  concluded,  that  the  appearance  was 
obstructed  by  the  clouds,  and  made  the  next  day  the  first  of 
the  following  month,  without  expecting  any  longer  ;  and 
of  twelve  of  these  months  their  common  year  consisted. 
But  twelve  lunar  months  falling  eleven  days  short  of  a  solar 
year,  every  one  of  those  common  years  began  eleven  days 
sooner  than  the  former;  which,  in  thirty-three  years  time, 
would  carry  back  the  beginning  of  the  year  through  all  the 
four  seasons  to  the  same  point  again,  and  get  a  whole  year 
from  the  solar  reckoning  (as  is  now  done  in  Turkey,  where 
this  sort  of  year  is  in  use ;)  for  the  remedying  of  which,  their 
usage  was  sometimes  in  the  third  year,  and  sometimes  in  the 
second,  to  cast  in  another  month,  and  make  their  year  then 

■  Lev.  XXV.  9,  10. 
t  Talmud  in  Tract.  Rosh  Hasshanah,  Maimonides  in  Kiddash  Hachode."-!!. 
Selden  de  Anno  Civili  veterum  Judaeorum. 


PRErACE.  77 

consist  of  thirteen  months  ;  whereby  they  constantly  redu- 
ced their  lunar  year,  as  far  as  such  an  intercalation  could 
effect  it,  to  that  of  the  sun,  and  never  suffered  the  one,  for 
any  more  than  a  month,  at  any  time  to  vary  from  the  other. 
And  this  they  were  forced  to  do  for  the  sake  of  their  festi- 
vals ;  for  their  feast  of  the  passover  (the  first  day  of  which 
*was  always  fixed  to  the  middle  of  their  month  Nisan)  being 
to  be  celebrated  by  their  eating  the  Paschal  lamb,  and  the 
offering  up  of  the  wave-sheaf,  as  the  first-fruits  of  their  bar- 
ley-harvest; and  their  feast  of  Pentecost,  which  was  Tkept 
the  fiftieth  day  after  the  Ibth  of  Nisan  (which  was  the  day  in 
which  the  wave-sheaf  was  offered)  being  to  be  celebrated  by 
the  offering  of  the  two  wave-loaves,  as  the  first-fruits  of 
their  Jwheat-harvest ;  and  their  feast  of  tabernacles,  which 
was  always  begun§  on  the  fifteenth  of  Tisri,  being  fixed  to 
the  time||  of  their  ingathering  of  all  the  fruits  of  the  earth  : 
the  passover  could  not  be  observed  till  the  lambs  were  grown 
fit  to  be  eaten,  and  the  barley  fit  to  be  reaped  ;  nor  the  Pen- 
tecost till  the  wheat  was  ripe  ;  nor  the  feast  of  tabernacles, 
till  the  ingatherings  of  the  vineyard  and  oliveyard  were  over  : 
and  therefore  these  festivals  being  fixed  to  these  set  seasons 
of  the  year,  the  making  of  the  intercalation  above  mentioned 
was  necessary,  for  the  keeping  them  within  a  month  sooner 
or  later  always  to  them.  Their  rule  for  the  doing  of  this 
was:1[  whenever,  according  to  the  course  of  the  common 
year,  the  fifteenth  day  of  Nisan  (which  was  the  first  day  of 
unleavened  bread,  and  the  first  day  of  their  Paschal  solemni- 
ty) happened  to  fall  before  the  day  of  their  vernal  equinox, 
then  they  intercalated  a  month,  and  the  Paschal  solemnity 
was  thereby  carried  on  a  month  farther  into  the  year,  and  all 
the  other  festivals  with  it  :  for,  according  as  the  Paschal 
festival  was  fixed,  so  were  all  the  rest ;  that  is,  the  Pente- 
cost fifty  days  after  the  second  day  of  the  Paschal  feast  (i.  e. 
the  sixteenth  of  Nisan,)  on  which  the  wave-sheaf  was  offer- 
ed ;  and  the  feast  of  tabernacles  six  months  after  the  begin- 
ning of  the  said  Paschal  feast.  For  as  the  first  day  of  the 
Paschal  feast  was  the  fifteenth  of  Nisan  (the  fourteenth,  on 
the  evening  of  which  the  solemnity  began  in  the  slaying  of 
the  Paschal  Iambs,  being  but  the  eve  of  the  passover)  so  the 
first  day  of  the  feast  of  tabernacles   was  on  the  fifteenth  of 

*  Exod..xii.3— 20.     Lev.  xxiii.  4—8.     Numb,  xxviii.  16,  17., 

t  Lev.  xxiii.  15 — 17.     Deut.  xvi.  9. 

i  Here  it  is  to  be  observed,  that  in  Judea  the  barley-harvest  was  before  th« 
wheat-harvest,  and  so  it  was  in  Egypt ;  for  the  barley  was  in  the  ear  when 
the  wheat  and  rye  were  not  grown  up.     Exod,  ix.  31,  32. 

^  Lev.  xxiii.  34,  39.  Ij  Lev.  xxiii.  39. 

11  Talmud  in  Rosh  Hasshanah.  Maimonides  in  Kiddush.  Hachodesh. 
"^plden  de  Anno  Civili  veterum  Judaeorum. 


78  PREFACE. 

Tisri,  just  six  months  after.  To  make  this  the  more  clear, 
let  it  be  observed,  that  the  Hebrew  months  were  as  foUow- 
eth :  first,  Nisan,  second,  lyar,  third,  Sivan,  fourth,  Tamuz, 
fifth,  Ab,  sixth,  Elul,  seventh,  Tisri,  eighth,  Marchesvan, 
ninth,  Cisleu,  tenth,  Tebeth,  eleventh,  Shebat,  twelfth,  Adar. 
And  these  twelve  made  their  common  year  :  but  in  their  in- 
tercalated years  there  was  another  month  added  after  Adar, 
which  they  called  Veadar,  or  the  second  Adar ;  and  then 
their  year  consisted  of  thirteen  months.  Supposing,  there- 
fore, their  vernal  equinox  should  have  been  on  the  tenth  of 
March  (whereabout  now  it  is,)  and  that  the  fifteenth  of  Ni- 
san, the  first  day  of  their  passover,  should,  in  the  common 
course  of  their  year,  happen  to  fall  on  the  ninth  of  March, 
the  day  before  the  equinox;  then,  on  their  foreseeing  of  this, 
they  intercalated  a  month,  and  after  their  Adar  added  their 
Veadar,  which  sometimes  consisted  of  twenty-nine  days,  and 
sometimes  of  thirty,  according  as  it  happened  ;  at  present 
we  will  suppose  it  to  be  of  thirty  days,  and  then  the  first  of 
Nisan,  which  is  to  begin  this  year,  mstead  of  being  on  the 
twenty-third  of  February  (as  otherwise  it  would,)  must  be 
carried  on  thirty  days  forward  to  the  twenty-fifth  of  March, 
and  their  passover  to  the  eighth  of  April  following.  But 
the  next  year  after  beginning  eleven  days  sooner,  for  the 
reason  1  have  mentioned,  the  first  of  Nisan  must  then  have 
happened  on  the  fourteenth  of  March,  and  the  first  day  of 
the  passover  on  the  twenty-eighth  of  the  same  month  ;  and, 
the  next  year  after  that,  the  first  of  Nisan,  must  for  the 
same  reason  have  happened  on  the  third  of  March,  and  the 
first  year  of  the  passover  on  the  seventeenth  of  March  ;  and 
the  next  year  after  that,  according  to  this  calculation,  the 
first  of  Nisan  would  have  happened  on  the  twentieth  of 
February,  and  the  first  day  of  the  passover  on  the  sixth  of 
March  following.  But  this  being  before  the  equinox,  ano- 
ther intercalation  of  the  month  Veadar  must  have  been 
made.  And  so  after  the  same  manner  it  went  through  all 
other  years ;  whereby  it  came  to  pass,  that  the  first  of  Ni- 
san, which  was  the  beginning  of  their  year,  always  was 
within  fifteen  days  before,  or  fifteen  days  after  the  vernal 
equinox,  that  is,  within  the  compass  of  thirty  days  in  the 
whole,  sooner  or  later ;  and  according  as  that  was  fixed,  so 
were  fixed  also  the  beginnings  of  all  their  other  months,  and 
all  the  fasts  and  feasts  observed  in  them.  But  this  in- 
artificial way  of  forming  their  months  and  years,  was  in  use 
among  them  only  while  they  lived  in  their  own  land,  and 
there  might  easily  receive  notice  of  what  was  ordained  in 
this  matter  by  those  who  had  the  care  and  ordering  of  it :  for 
when  they  became  dispersed  through  all  nations,  they  were 


PREFACE.  J  9 

torccd  to  make  use  of"  cycles  and  astronomical  calculations 
for  the  fixing  of  their  new  moons  and  intercalations,  and  the 
times  of  their  feasts,  fasts,   and  other  observances,  that  so 
they  might  be  every  where  uniform  herein.     The  first  cycle 
they  made  use  of  for  this  purpose*   was  that  of  eighty-four 
years  :  by  this  they  fixed  their  Paschal  feast,  and    by  that 
their  whole  year  besides ;  and  the  use  hereof  the  primitive 
Christians  borrowed  from  them,  and   for  some  of  the  first 
centuries,   fixed  their  Easter  in  every  year  according  to  it: 
but   this,  after  some  time,  being  found  to  be  faulty,  Meto's 
cycle  of  nineteen  years!   was,    after  the   council  of  Nice, 
brought   into  use  by  them  for  this  purpose  instead  of  the 
other  ;  and  the  Jews,  following  their  example  herein,  almost 
about  the  same  time,  came  into  the  same  usage   also  ;  and 
upon  this  cycle  is  founded  the  present  form  of  their  year. 
The  first  who  began  to  work  it  into  this  shape, J   was  Rabbi 
Samuel,  rector  of  the  Jewish  school  at  Sora  in  Mesopotamia : 
Rabbi    Adda,  who    was    a   great  astronomer,    pursued    his 
scheme  ;    and  after  him  Rabbi  Hillel,    about  A.  D.    360, 
brought  it  to  that  perfection  in  which  now  it  is  ;  and  being 
Nasi,  or  prince  of  their  sanhedrim,  he  gave  it  the  authority 
of  his  sanction,  and  by  virtue  thereof  it  hath  ever  since  been 
observed  by  them,  and  they  say  always  is  to  be  observed  to" 
the  coming  of  the  Messiah.     According  to  this  form§  there 
are,   within  the    compass  of  the  said  nineteen  years  cycle, 
seven  intercalated  years,  consisting  of  thirteen  months,  and 
twelve  common  years,    consisting  of  twelve  months.     The 
intercalated  years  are  the  third,   the  sixth,    the  eighth,  the 
eleventh,  the  fourteenth,  the  seventeenth,  and  the  nineteenth 
of  that  cycle  ;  and  when  one  round  of  this  cycle  is  over,  they 
begin  another;  and  so  constantly,  according  to  it,  fix  their 
new  moons  (at  which  all  their  months  begin)   and  all  their 
fasts  and  feasts  in  every  year.     And  this  form  of  their  year, 
it  must  be  acknowledged,  is  very  exactly  and  astronomically 
contrived,   and  may  truly  be  reckoned  the  greatest  piece  of 
art  and  ingenuity  that  is  to   be  found  among  that  people. — 
They  who  would   thoroughly  understand  it,    may  read  Mai- 
monides's  tract   Kiddush  Hachodesh,  which  hath  been  pub- 
lished in  a  very  good   Latin   translation    by  Lewis  de  Veil, 
under  the  title,  De  Consecratione  Calendarum,    where  he 
will  find  it  very  exactly  and  perspicuously  described. 

*  Vide  Bucherium  de  antique  Paschali  Judffiorum  Cyclo. 

t  Epistola  Arabrosii  83  ad  episcopus  per  /Erailiam  constitutos.  It  was  by 
the  council  of  Nice  referred  to  the  church  of  Alexandria,  every  year  to  fix 
the  time  of  Easter,  and  they  did  it  by  Meto's  cycle  of  nineteen  years. 

t  Juchasin  ;  Shalslieleth  Haccabala  ;  h  Zemach  David,  &,  ex  iisdetn  Mo- 
rinus  in  exercitat.    Prima  in  Pentateuchum  Samaritanum,  cap.  3. 

§  Talmud  in  Rosh  Hasshanah.  Maimonides  in  Kiddush  Hachodesh,  k, 
Seldeniis  de  Anno  Civili  veterum  Judseorum 


80  PREFACK. 

These  having  been  the  forms  of  the  Jewish  year,  that  i?, 
the  inartificial  form  used  by  the  ancients  in  the  land  of  Ca- 
naan, and  the  artificial  and  astronomical  form  now  in  use 
among  the  moderns  throughout  all  their  dispersions  ;  accord- 
ing to  neither  of  them  can  the  days  of  the  Jewish  months 
be  fixed  to  any  certain  days  of  the  months  in  the  Julian  year; 
for,  in  both  of  them,  the  months  being  lunar,  and  the  inter- 
calations made  of  one  whole  lunar  month  at  once,  the  days  of 
those  months,  to  the  full  extent  of  one  full  lunar  month,  fell 
sometimes  sooner,  and  sometimes  later  in  the  solar  form. 
Since  the  Jewish  calendar  hath  been  fixed  by  Rabbi  Hiliel, 
upon  the  certain  foundations  of  astronomy,  tables  may  indeed 
be  made,  which  may  point  out  to  what  day  in  that  calendar 
every  day  in  the  Julian  jear  shall  answer ;  but  this  cannot 
be  done  for  the  time  before  ;  because,  while  they  went  inar- 
tificialiy  to  work  in  this  matter  by  the  phasis  and  appearance 
of  the  moon,  both  for  the  beginning  of  their  months  and  years, 
and  the  making  of  their  intercalations,  they  did  not  always  do 
it  exactly  ;  but  often  varied  from  the  astronomical  truth  here- 
in. And  this  latter  having  been  their  way  through  all  the 
times  of  which  this  History  treats,  we  cannot,  when  we  find 
the  day  of  any  Jewish  month  mentioned  either  in  the  Scrip- 
tures or  in  Joscphus,  reduce  it  exactly  to  its  time  in  the  Ju- 
lian year,  or  there  fix  it  any  nearer,  than  within  the  compass 
of  a  month  sooner  or  later.  Kepler  indeed  holds,  that  the 
Jewish  year  was  a  solar  year,  consisting  of  twelve  months, 
of  thirty  days  each,  and  an  addition  of  five  days  after  the  last 
of  them;  and  our  countrymen,  archbishop  Usher  and  Mr, 
Lydiat,  two  of  the  most  eminent  chronologers  that  any  age 
hath  produced,  go  into  the  same  opinion.  Such  a  year  I  ac- 
knowledge, was  in  use  among  the  Chaldeans,  from  whom 
Abraham  was  descended  ;  and  also  among  the  Egyptians, 
with  whom  the  Israelites  long  lived  :  and  I  doubt  not,  but 
that,  before  their  coming  out  of  the  land  of  Egypt,  they  also 
reckoned  their  time  by  the  same  form.  For  the  time  of  the 
flood  is  manifestly  computed  by  it*  in  the  book  of  Genesis, 
an  hundred  and  fifty  days  being  there  made  equal  to  five 
months,  which  proves  those  months  to  have  been  thirty-day 
months.  But  that  the  Israelites  made  use  of  this  sort  of 
year,  after  their  coming  out  of  Egypt,  can  never  be  made 
consisting  with  the  Mosaical  law.  According  to  that,  their 
year  must  be  made  up  of  months  purely  lunar,  and  could  no 
otherwise,  than  by  an  intercalary  month,  be  reduced  to  the 
solar  form  :  and  there  being  a  necessity  of  making  this  inter- 
calation for  the  keeping  of  their  festivals  to  their  proper  sea- 

'  Chnp  vii.  11,  compared  with  cIicTji.  viii.  3,  4. 


r^ErAt;K. 


31 


sons,  by  this  nieatis  it  comes  to  pass,  tliat  the  beginnings  of 
their  months  cannot  be  fixed  to  any  certain  day  in  the  Julian 
calendar,  but  they  fell  always  witliin  the  compass  of  thirty 
days  sooner  or  later  therein.  That  the  thing  may  appear 
the  clearer  to  the  reader,  I  shall  express  it  in  this  following 
scheme,  wherein  the  first  column  gives  the  names  of  the  Jew- 
ish months,  and  the  second  of  the  Julian  months,  within  the 
compass  of  which  the  said  Jewish  months  set  over  against 
them  have  always  sooner  or  later  their  beginning  and  end- 
ing ;  and  this  is  the  nearest  view  that  can  be  giving  of  the  cor- 
respondency of  the  one  with  the  other. 

5  November. 
^  December. 


1  Nisan 

2  Jair 

3  Sivan 

4  Tamuz 


(  March. 
>  JlpHl. 
X  April. 
\  May. 
\  May. 
I  Jane. 
^  June. 
\  July. 


5  Ab 
6Eiul    - 

7  Tizri    - 

8  Merchesuan 


5  July. 
I  J3ugv.st. 
^  August. 
(  September. 
\  September. 
\  October. 

October. 

JVovember. 


9  Cisleu 


10  Tebeth 


^  December. 
I  January. 

11  Shebat    )-i"/««'-^- 

^  February, 

12  Adar       ^  ^ebriiary. 

(  Ma  arch. 


The  thirteenth  month  called  Veadar,  or  the  second  Adar, 
answered  most  the  end  of  our  March,  it  being  then  only  in- 
tercalated, or  cast  in,  when  the  beginning  of  Nisan  would 
otherwise  be  carried  back  into  the  end  of  February. 

I  have,  in  the  series  of  this  History,  taken  no  notice  either 
of  the  jubilees,   or  the  sabbatical  years  of  the  Jews,   both 
liecause  of  the  uselessness,  and  also  of  the  uncertainty   of 
them.     They  are  useless,  because  they  help  not  to  the  ex- 
plaining of  any  thing,  either  in   the  holy  Scriptures,  or  the 
histories  of  the   times  which  i  treat  of;  and  they  are  uncer- 
tain, because  it  dotli  not  appear  when  or  how  they  were  ob- 
served.     It  is  acknowledged  by  most  learned  men,  that  the 
jubilees  were  no  more  regarded  after  the  Babylonish  captivi- 
ty; and  it  is  manifest  from  Scripture,  that  the  sabbatical  year^ 
were  wholly  neglected  for  many  ages  before  it.     For  the  de- 
aolation,  which  happened  to  the  country  of  Judea,  under  that 
captivity,  is  said,  in  the  second  book  of  Chronicles,  xxxvi.  21, 
to  have  been  brought  upon  it  for  this  very  reason,  that  the 
land  might  enjoy  its  sabbaths,  that  is,  those  sabbatical   years 
of  rest,  which  the  Jews,  in  neglecting  the  law  of  God  concern- 
ing this  matter,  had  deprived  it  of:  and  therefore  if  we  reck- 
on to  this  desolation  only  the  fifty-two  years,  that  were  from 
the  destruction  of  the  city  and  temple  of  Jerusalem,  to  the 
end  of  the  Babyloni>h  captivity  (in  which  the  land  was  whol- 
ly desolated)  (his  will  prove  the  observing  of  those  sabbatical 
years   to  have  been  neglected    for  three  huiidred  and  sixty- 
four  years  before  that  captivity.     But,  if  we  add   hereto  the 
other  eighteen  years  of  that  captivity,  in  which  it  was  only 
in  part  desolated^  and  take  in   the  whole  seventy  years  of  it 
>'(M  .  f,  •!  1 


82  PHKFACE. 

into  this  reckoning,  it  will  then  carry  up  the  time  of  this 
neglect  much  higher,  even  to  four  hundred  and  ninety  years 
beibre  that  captivity:  and,  as  to  the  jubilees,  there  is  no 
mention  made  of  them  any  where  through  the  whole  Scrip- 
tures, saving  only  in  that  law  where  they  are  enjoined,  neither 
is  there  of  their  sabbatical  years,  saving  only  in  the  same  law, 
and  the  place  in  Chronicles  above  mentioned.  There  are 
indeed  two  other  places  of  Scripture  which  some  understand 
concerning  them,  (that  is,  2  Kings  six.  29,  and  Jer.  xxxiv. 
8 — 10.)  But  both  these  passages  do  better  admit  of  other 
interpretations  :  for  what  is  said  in  the  former  of  these,  seems 
rather  to  refer  to  the  desolations  of  the  war,  and  the  inter- 
I  uption  of  agriculture  through  the  violences  and  calamity  ofit, 
than  to  a  sabbatical  year  ;  and  so  Grotius  and  other  learned 
men  understand  it.  And  Avhat  is  said  in  the  other  by  Jeremiah, 
about  the  release  of  servants,  doth  not  infer  a  sabbatical  year, 
nor  a  jubilee  neither  :  for  every  Hebrew  servant*  was  to  be 
released  in  the  seventh  year  of  his  servitude,  though  it  were 
neither  a  jubilee  nor  a  sabbatical  year ;  and  therefore  this 
instance  infers  neither  of  them  ;  and  those  who  undertake  to 
interpret  the  law  which  enjoins  these  jubilees  and  sabbatical 
years,  very  much  differ  concerning  them,  both  as  to  the  time 
and  manner  of  their  observance.  Some  will  have  the  reck- 
oning, both  of  the  sabbatical  years  and  the  jubilees,  to  com- 
mence from  the  first  entering  of  the  Israelites  into  the  land 
of  Canaan;  and  therefore  place  the  first  sabbatical  year  in 
the  seventh  year  after  that  entrance,  and  the  first  jubilee  also 
according  hereto ;  but  others  say,  that  the  land  was  seven  years 
in  conquering  and  dividing,  and  that  the  eighth  year  was  the 
first  in  which  the  Israelites  began  to  sow  and  reap  in  it;  and 
that  therefore  the  fourteenth  year  was  the  first  sabbatical 
year:  and  according  to  this  reckoning  they  put  the  first  sab- 
batical year,  and  the  first  jubilee,  seven  years  later  than  the 
former,  and  so  the  numbers  of  all  the  rest  that  follow.  An^l 
then,  as  to  the  time  of  the  jubilee,  there  is  this  dispute,  whether 
it  be  the  same  with  the  seventh  sabbatical  year,  or  the  next 
yearafter.  The  reason  of  this  dispute  is,  because  ifitbeon 
the  year  after  the  seventh  sabbatical  year,  then  there  will  be 
two  sabbatical  years  together,  (for  the  year  of  jubilee  was 
alsot  a  sabbatical  year  ;)  and  in  this  case  there  would  be  the 
loss  of  two  crops  together;  and  then  it  will  be  asked,  how 
could  the  people  be  supported?  And  they  who,  notwith- 
standing this  objection,  determine  foi-  the  year  next  after  the 
seventh  sabbatical  year  to  have  been  the  year  of  jubilee, 
thoughl  they  have  the  Scripture  on  their  side  in  this  particu- 

*  Kxodus  xxi.  2.  |  Levit.  xiv.  II. 

5  Levit.  >xv^lO. 


I'REFACJE.  8.3 

iar,  yet  are  not  agreed  where  to  begin  the  next  week  of  years 
(or  Shemittah,  as  the  Jews  call  it)  after  the  seventh  sabbatical 
year  ;  that  is,  whether  the  year  of  jubilee,  or  the  next  year 
after  it,  was  to  be  the  tirst  year  of  that  week,  or  Shemittah. 
If  the  jubilee  year  were  the  first  year  of  that  week,  then  there 
would  have  been  but  five  years  for  them  to  sow  and  reap  in 
between  the  jubilee  (which  was  also  a  sabbatical  year)  and 
the  next  sabbatical  year  after;  whereas*  the  Scripture  saith 
they  were  to  have  six.  And  if  the  tirst  year  of  the  next  She- 
mittah were  the  next  year  after  the  jubilee,  then  the  Shamit- 
tahs  would  not  always  succeed  in  an  exact  series  immediate- 
ly one  after  the  other  ;  but  after  the  seventh  Shemittah,  the 
year  of  jubilee  would  intervene  between  that  and  the  next : 
which  disagreeth  with  the  opinion  of  many.  However,  it 
is  indeed  the  truth  of  the  matter,  and  I  know  no  objection 
against  it,  but  tliat  it  exposeth  the  error  of  those,  who,  think- 
ing that  the  sabbatical  years  did  always  happen  each  exactly 
on  the  seventh  year  after  the  former,  have  in  that  order 
and  series  placed  them  in  (heir  chronological  computations. 
without  considering,  that  after  every  forty-ninth  year  a 
jubilee  year  did  intervene  between  the  Shemittah  that  then 
ended,  and  the  beginning  of  the  next  that  followed.  But  they 
act  most  cut  of  the  way  in  this  matter,  who  would  confine 
Daniel's  prophecy  of  the  seventy  weeks  to  so  many  Shemit- 
tahs,  as  if  these  seventy  weeks  fell  in  exactly  with  seventy 
Shemittahs.  that  is,  that  the  tirst  week  began  with  the 
first  year  of  a  Shemittah  or  sabbatical  week,  and  ended  with 
a  sabbatical  year,  which  was  the  last  of  a  Shemittah  ;  and  so 
all  the  rest  down  to  the  last  of  the  whole  number  :  and  to  this 
end  some  have  perplexed  themselves  in  vain  to  lind  out  sab- 
batical years  to  suit  their  hypothesis,  and  fix  them  to  times  to 
which  they  never  did  belong;  whereas  the  prophecy  means 
no  more  than  I)y  the  seventy  weeks  to  express  seventy  times 
seven  years,  that  is,  four  hundred  and  ninety  in  the  whole, 
without  any  relation  had  either  to  Shemittahs  or  sabbatical 
years.  And  were  it  otherwise,  the  seventy  weeks  of  Daniel, 
besides  the  seventy  Shemittahs,  must  have  contained  nineyears 
more  for  the  nine  jubilees  which  must  have  happened  with- 
in the  compass  of  the  said  seventy  Shemittahs,  and  thereby 
make  the  whole  number  of  those  weeks  to  be  four  hundred 
and  ninety-nine  years,  which  no  one  that  I  know  of  hath  ever 
yet  said.  And  therefore,  since  there  is  nothing  certain  to  be 
known  concerning  these  sabbatical  years  and  jubilees  of  the 
Jews,  as  to  their  ancient  observance  of  them,  and  consequent- 
ly there  can  be  no  use  made  of  them,  for  the  explication 
either  of  Scripture  or  history,  I  have  not  troubled  the  reader 

*  Lrvit.  x\v.  3. 


84  PRKFACE. 

with  them  in  the  body  of  this  History;  and  I  wish  I  have  tiui 
iroublc'd  him  too  far  in  saying  so  much  of  them  here  in  the 
Preface. 

In  the  scries  of  this  History,  having  often  endeavoured  to 
reduce  the  sums  of  money  mentioned  therein  to  the  value  thev 
would  hear  with  us  in  this  present  age,  whetliergold  or  silver, 
I  think  it  requisite  to  lay  down  the  rules  whereby  I  make 
this  reduction.  It  is  to  be  observed,  therefore,  in  order  here- 
to, that,  among  the  ancients,  the  way  of  reckoning  their 
money  was  by  talents.  So  the  Hebrews,  so  the  Babylonians, 
so  the  Greeks,  and  so  the  Romans  did  reckon  ;  and  of  these 
talents  they  l)ad  subdivisions,  which  were  usually  into  minas 
and  drachms.  /.  c.  of  tlseir  talents  into  minas,  and  their  minas 
into  drachms.  I'he  Hebrews  had,  besides  these,  their  shekels 
and  half  shekels,  or  bekas,  and  the  Romans  their  denarii  y 
which  last  were  very  near  of  the  same  value  with  the  drachms 
of  the  Greeks.  AVhat  was  the  value  of  an  Hebrew  talent 
appears  from  Ex.  xxxviii.  25,  26  :  for  there  six  hundred  and 
three  thouf-and  five  hundred  and  tifty  persons  being  taxed  at 
an  half  shekel  an  head,  they  must  have  paid  in  the  whole 
three  hundred  and  one  thousand  seven  hundred  and  seventy- 
five  shekels  ;  and  that  sum  is  there  said  to  amount  to  one 
hundred  talents,  and  one  thousand  seven  hundred  and  seven- 
five  shekels  over  :  if,  therefore,  you  deduct  the  one  thousand 
seven  hundred  and  seventj'-five  shekels  from  the  number 
three  hundred  and  one  thousand  seven  hundred  and  seventy- 
five,  and  divide  the  remaining  sum,  i.  e.  three  hundred  thou- 
sand by  one  hundred,  this  will  prove  each  of  those  talents  to 
contain  three  thousand  shekels.  Each  of  these  shekels 
weighed  about  three  shillings  of  our  money,  and  sixty  of 
them,  Ezekiel*  tells  us,  made  a  mina,  and  therefore  fifty 
of  those  minas  n^ide  a  talent.  And  as  to  their  drachms,  it 
appears  by  the  gospel  of  St.  Matthew,  that  it  was  the  fourth 
part  of  a  shekel,  that  is,  nine-pence  of  our  money:  for  there 
(chap.  xvii.  24.)  the  tribute  money  annually  paid  to  the  tem- 
j)leby  every  Jew  (which  was  thaif  a  shekel)  is  called  AtS^^cj^^i^v, 
(/.  e.  the  two-drachm  piece  :)  and  therefore,  if  an  half  shekel 
contained  two  drachms,  a  drachm  must  have  been  the 
.'|Uarlcr  part  of  a  shekel,  and  every  shekel  must  have  con- 
tained four  of  them  ;  and  so  Josephus  tells  us  it  did  ;  for  hej 
-aith  that  a  shekel  contained  four  Attic  drachms  ;  which  is 
not  exactly  to  be  understood  according  to  the  weight,  but 
according  to  the  valuation  in  the  currency  of  common  pay- 
ments :  for  according  to  the  weight,  the  heaviest  Attic  drachms 
did  not  exceed  eight-pence  farthing  half  farthing  of  our 
money,  and  an  Hebrew  drachm,  as  I  have  said,  was  nine- 

-''  t7bap.  jilv.  12.       i  Talmud  in  Shrkalim.         t-  Anfiq.  lib.  3;  c.  fi. 


FREFAeE.  da 

pence  ;  but  what  the  Attic  drachm  fell  short  of  the  Hebrew 
in  weight  might  be  made  up  in  the  fineness,  and  its  ready 
currency  in  all  countries  (which  last  the  Hebrew  drachm 
could  not  have,)  and  so  might  be  made  equivalent  in  common 
estimation  among  the  Jews.  Allowing,  therefore,  a  drachm, 
as  well  Attic  as  Jewish,  as  valued  in  Judea,  to  be  equivalent 
to  nine-pence  of  our  money,  a  beka,  or  half  shekel,  will  be 
equal  to  one  shilling  and  sixpence,  a  shekel  three  shillings, 
a  mina  nine  pounds,  and  a  talent  four  hundred  and  fift}  pounds. 
So  was  it  in  the  time  of  Moses  and  Ezekiel,  and  so  was  it  the 
same  in  the  time  of  Josephus,  among  that  people;  for*  he 
tells  us,  that  an  Hebrew  mina  contained  two  litras  and  an  half, 
which  comes  exactly  to  nine  pounds  of  our  money  ;  for  a  litra, 
being  the  same  with  a  Roman  libra,  contained  twelve  ounces 
troy  weight,  that  is,  ninety-six  drachms,  and  therefore  two 
litras  and  a  half  must  contain  two  hundred  and  forty  drachms, 
which  being  estimated  at  nine-pence  a  drachm,  according  to 
the  Jewish  valuation,  comes  exactly  to  sixty  shekels,  or  nine 
pounds  of  our  money.  And  this  accoujit  exactly  agrees 
with  that  of  Alexandria  ;  fort  the  Alexandrian  talent  con- 
tained twelve  thousand  Attic  drachms,  and  Iwtdve  thousand 
Attic  drachms,  according  to  the  Jewish  valuation,  being 
twelve  thousand  of  our  nine-pences,  they  amount  to  four 
hundred  and  fifty  pounds  of  sterling  money,  which  is  the 
same  value  with  the  Mosaic  talent.  But  here  it  is  to  be 
observed,  that  though  the  Alexandrian  talent  amounted  to 
twelve  thousand  Attic  drachms,  yet  they  themselves  reckon- 
ed it  but  at  six  thousand  drachms,  because  every  Alexandrian 
drachm  contained:}:  two  Attic  drachms  ;  and  therefore,  the 
Septuagint  versiorj  being  made  by  the  Alexandrian  Jews, 
they  there  render  the  Hebrew  word  shekel  by  the  Greek 
Ai^^ux/^^^ vfh'ich  signifieih  two  drachms;  because  two  Alexan- 
drian drachms  make  a  shekel,  two  of  them  amounting  to  as 
much  as  four  Attic  drachms ;  and  therefore  computing  the 
Alexandrian  money  according  to  the  same  method  in  which 
we  have  computed  the  Jewish,  it  will  be  as  followeth  :  one 
drachm  of  Alexandria  will  be  of  our  money  eighteen-pence  ; 
one  didrachrn,  or  shekel,  consisting  of  two  drachms  of  Alexan- 
dria, or  four  of  Attica,  will  be  three  shillings  ;  one  mina,  con- 
sisting of  sixty  didrachms,  or  shekels,  will  be  nine  pounds;  and 
one  talent,  consisting  of  fifty  minas,  will  be  four  hundred  and 
fifty  pounds,  which  is  the  talent  of  Moses, §  and  so  also  it  is 

"  Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  14,  cap.  12. 

i  Festiis  Pompeius,  Dionysius  Halicamasseus  etiam  dicit,  talentum  Alex- 
andrinum  continere  125  libras  Roraanasi  librae  autem  Romance  125  conti- 
nent drachmas  Alticas  12,000. 

jfVario  eestimat  drachmas  Alexandrinas  duplo  superasse  Atticasve  Tv- 
ria^vc.  f  Ex.  xssviii,  26,  2fi. 


86  PREFACE. 

the  talent  of  Josephus  ;*  for  he  tells  us,  that  an  Hebrew  talent 
contained  an  hundred  Greek,  (?'.  e.  Attic)  minas  ;  for  those  fifty 
minas,  which  here  make  an  Alexandrian  talent,  would  be  one 
hundred  Attic  minas  in  the  like  method  of  valuation,  the 
Alexandrian  talent  containing  double  as  much  as  the  Attic 
talent,  both  in  the  whole,  and  also  in  all  its  parts,  in  whatso- 
ever method  both  shall  be  equally  distributed.  Among  the 
Greeks,  the  established  rule  vvas,t  tliat  one  hundred  drachms 
made  a  mina,  and  sixty  minas  a  talent ;  but,  in  some  different 
states,  their  drachms  being  different,  accordingly  their  minas 
and  talents  were  within  the  same  proportion  different  also. 
But  the  money  of  Attica  was  the  standard  by  which  all  the 
rest  were  valued,  according  as  they  more  or  less  differed  from 
it;  and  therefore,  it  being  of  most  note,  wherever  any  Greek 
historian  speaks  of  talents,  minas,  or  drachms,  if  they  be  sim- 
ply mentioned,  it  is  always  to  be  understood  of  talents,  minas, 
or  drachms,  of  Attica,  and  never  of  the  talents,  minas,  or 
drachms  of  any  other  place,  unless  it  be  expressed,  Mr. 
Brerewood,  going  by  the  goldsmiths'  weights, |  reckons  an 
Attic  drachm  to  be  the  same  with  a  drachm  now  in  use  in 
their  shops,  that  is,  the  eighth  part  of  an  ounce  ;  and  there- 
fore lays  it  at  the  value  of  seven-pence  halfpenny  of  our 
money,  or  the  eighth  part  of  a  crown,  which  is,  or  ought  to  be, 
an  ounce  weight.  But  Dr.  Bernard,  going  more  accurately  to 
work.§  lays  the  middle  sort  of  Attic  drachms  at  eight-pence 
farthing  of  our  money,  and  the  minas  or  talents  accordingly 
in  the  proportions  above  mentioned.  The  Babylonian  talent, 
according  to  Pollux, ||  contained  seven  thousand  of  those 
drachms.  The  Roman  talentHcontained  seventy-two  Italic  mi- 
nas, which  were  the  same  with  the  Roman  libras ;  and  ninety- 
six  Roman  denarii,  each  being  of  the  value  of  seven-pence 
halfpenny  of  our  money,  made  a  Roman  libra.  But  all  the 
valuations  1  have  hitherto  mentioned  must  be  understood 
only  of  silver  money,  and  not  of  gold ;  for  that  was  much 
higher.  The  proportion  of  gold  to  silver  was  among  the 
ancients  most  commonly  as  ten  to  one;  sometimes  it  was  raised 
to  be  as  eleven  to  one,  and  sometimes  as  twelve,  and  some- 
times as  thirteen  to  one.  In  the  time  of  king  F>dward  1.  it 
was  here  in  England  at  the  value  of  ten  to  one  ;  but  it  is 
now  gotten  at  sixteen  to  one,  and  so  I  value  it  in  all  the  re- 
ductions which  I  make  in  this  Historv  of  ancient  sums  to  the 
present  value-  But,  to  make  the  whole  of  this  matter  the 
easier  to  the  reader,  I  will  lay  all  of  it  before  him,  for  his 
clear  view,  in  this  following  table  of  valuations. 

'^  Antiq.  lib.  3,  c.  7.  4  Julii  Pollucis  Onomasticon,  lib.  10,  c.  6. 

X  In  libro  de  Ponderibus  et  Pretiis  Vetenim  Xummorum. 

^  In  libro  de  Mensuris  et  Ponderibus  Antiquis. 

II  Lib.  10,  c,  6,  p.  437.  ^  Festus  Pompeius. 


PREFACE.  87 

Hebrew  Monty.  ■£.  s.  d. 

All  Hebrew  drachm  •  -  -  ■  -        0  0  9 

Two  drachms  made  a  beka,  or  half  shekel,  which  was  the  tribute 

money  paid  by  every  Jew  to  the  temple  -  -        0  1  0 

Two  bekas  made  a  shekel  -  -  -  -        0  3  0 

Sixty  shekels  made  a  mina  -  -  -  -        9  0  0 

Fifty  minas  made  a  talent  -      .      -  -  -    450  0  0 

A  talent  of  gold,  sixteen  to  one  "  *  "  ".  ^^^  ^  ^ 

Attic  Monet/,  according  to  Mr.  Brerewood. 

An  Attic  drachm         -  -  -  -  -  -        0    0  7 1-2 

An  hundred  drachms  made  a  mina    -  -  -  -        3    2  6 

Sixty  niinao  made  a  talent     -----     187   10  0 

A  talent  of  gold,  sixteen  to  one  .  -  -  -  3000    0  0 

Attic  Money,  according  to  Dr.  Bernard. 

An  Attic  drachm         -  -  -  -  -  -        0  0  8 1-4 

An  hundred  drachms  made  a  mina  -  -  -        3  8  9 

Sixty  minas  made  a  talent      -----     206  5  0 

A  talent  of  gold,  sixteen  to  one  -  -  -  -3300  0  0 

Bahylonish  Money,  according  to  Mr.  Brerewood. 

A  Babylonish  talent  of  silver,  containing  7000  Attic  drachms  218  15    0 
A  Babylonish  talent  of  gold,  sixteen  to  one  -  -  3500    0    0 

Babylonish  Money ^  according  to  Dr.  Bernard. 

A  Babylonish  talent  in  silver  -  .  -  -     240  12    6 

A  Babylonish  talent  of  gold,  sixteen  to  one  -  -  3850    0    0 

Alexandrian  Money. 

A  drachm  of  Alexandria,  containing  two  Attic  drachms,  as  valued 

by  the  Jews  -  -  -  -  -  -        0     1     6 

A  didrachra  of  Alexandria,  containing  two  Alexandrian  drachms, 
which  was  an  Hebrew  shekel     -  -  -  -        0 

Sixty  didrachms,  or  Hebrew  shekels,  made  a  mina  -        9 

Fifty  minas  made  a  talent      -----     450 

A  talent  of  gold,  sixteen  to  one         -  .  .  -  72OO 

Roman  Money. 

Four  sesterii  made  a  Roman  denarius             -  -            -  0  0  7 1-2 

?finety-six  Homan   denarii   made  an   Italic  mina,  which  was 

the  same  with  a  Roman  libra       -             -  -             -  3  0  0 

Seventy-two  Roman  libras  made  a  talent      -  -            -  216  0  0 

If  any  desire  a  fuller  account  of  the  money  of  the  ancients 
he  may  read  Mr.  Brerewood  De  Ponderibus  et  Pretiis  veterum 
.yummormn,  bishop  Cumberland  of  the  Jewish  measures, 
weights,  and  moneys,  Dr.  Bernard  De  Mensuris  et  Ponderibus 
Antiquis,  and  others  that  have  written  of  this  argument.  It 
sufticeth  for  ray  present  purpose,  that  I  here  insert  so  much 
as  may  serve  for  a  key  to  those  passages  in  the  ensuing  His- 
tory, where  any  sum  of  money,  or  any  quantity  of  gold  or 
silver,  is  mentioned. 

So  little  mention  having  been  mad>e  of  Zoroastres  by  the 
western  writers,  whether  Greek  or  Latin,  the  reader  may 
perchance  be  surprised  to  find  so  much  said  of  him  in  this 


3 

0 

0 

0 

0 

0 

0 

0 

68  PREFACE. 

History,  anil  his  time  placed  so  much  later  than  is  vulgarly 
reckoned.  But,  how  sparingly  soever  the  Greeks  or  Latins 
may  have  been  in  speaking  of  him,  what  hath  been  wanting 
in  them  hath  been  sufficiently  supplied  by  the  Persians  and 
Arabs,  who  have  given  us  large  accounts  of  him,  and  have 
placed  his  time  where  truly  it  was,  that  is,  in  the  time  of 
Darius  Hyst-aspes.  kinti;  of  Persia.  What^soever  we  find  writ- 
ten of  him  by  the  Arabs  is  taken  from  the  Persians  ;  for  it 
was  not  till  after  the  time  of  Vlaho  net  that  the  Arabs  had 
any  literature  among  them  ;  but  the  Persians  had  it  long  be- 
fore :  for  we  find  in  Scripture,*  that  the  Persians  had  books 
and  registers,  in  which  all  the  actions  of  their  kings,  and  the 
histories  of  their  reigns,  were  carefully  recorded  ;  and  Cte- 
siasf  tells  us  the  same,  and  that  it  was  out  of  those  books 
and  registers  that  he  extracted  his  history,  which  he  wrote 
of  the  Assyrian  and  Persian  affairs, J  in  twenty-three  books; 
and  Persia  being  the  country  which  was  the  scene  of  all 
Zoroastres's  doings,  there  it  is  that  we  may  most  likely  expect 
the  best  account  of  him.  And  since  he  was  there  the  foun- 
der and  great  patriarch  of  the  religion  which  was  received 
and  reigned  in  that  country,  from  the  time  of  Darius  Hys- 
taspes  to  the  death  of  Yazdejerd,  for  near  eleven  hundred 
and  fifty  years,  and  consequently  was  among  them  (as  he 
still  is  among  the  remainder  of  that  sect)  in  the  same  es- 
teem and  veneration  that  Mahomet  is  among  the  Mahomet- 
ans, no  wonder  that  much  hath  been  said  of  him  by  their 
writers;  and,  if  those  writers  have  been  as  ancient  as  those 
of  the  Greeks  and  other  nations,  I  know  not  why  they  should 
not  have  the  same  authority.  I  acknowledge  many  fabulous 
things  have  crept  into  their  writings  concerning  him,  as  there 
have  into  the  Roman  legends  of  their  saints,  and  for  the 
same  reason,  that  is,  to  create  in  vulgar  minds  the  greater 
veneration  for  him.  What  1  have  out  of  the  latter.  I  ara 
beholden  for  to  Dr.  Hyde's  book,  De  Religione  veterum  Per- 
sarum,  for  I  understand  not  the  Persian  language.  All  that 
could  be  gotten  out  of  both  these  sorts  of  writers  concern- 
ing him  OP  his  religion,  that  carry  with  it  any  air  of  truth,  is 
here  carefully  laid  together;  as  also  every  thing  else  that 
is  said  of  eitlier  of  them  by  the  Greeks,  or  any  other  au- 
thentic writers  ;  and.  out  of  all  this  put  together  is  made  up 
that  account  which  I  have  given  of  this  famous  impostor. 
And  if  the  Life  of  Mahomet,  which  I  have  formerly  publish- 
ed, be  compared  herewith,  it  will  appear  hereby,  how  much 
of  the  way,  which  this  latter  impostor  took  for  the  propaga- 

*  Ezra  iv.  15,  19  ;  v.  17 ;  vi.  1,  2.     Esther  vi.  1. 
+  Apud  Diodorum  Siculura,  lib.  2. 
,  Photius  in  Excerpti?. 


ting  of  his  fraud,  had  been  chalked  out  lo  him  by  (he  others 
Both  of  them  were  very  crafty  knaves  :  butZoroastres  being 
a  person  of  the  greatest  learning  of  his  tinae,  and  the  other 
so  wholly  ignorant  of  it,  that  he  could  neither  write  nor 
read,  he  was  by  much  the  more  eminent  of  the  two, 
though  the  other  hath  had  the  greater  success  in  the  pro- 
pagation of  his  sect ;  the  magians  scarce  having  ever  en- 
larged themselves  beyond  the  present  bounds  of  the  kingdom 
of  Persia,  and  some  parts  of  Mesopotamia,  Arabia,  and  In- 
dia ;  whereas  the  Mahometans  have  overspread  a  great  part 
of  the  world  ;  for  which  they  have  been  beholden  to  the  pre- 
vailing power  of  two  mighty  empires  erected  by  them,  that 
is,  that  of  the  Saracens  first,  and  next  that  of  the  Turks, 
who  having  extended  their  conquests  over  many  countries 
and  kingdoms,  have,  by  the  power  of  the  sword,  subjuga^ 
ted  the  inhabitants  to  their  religion,  as  well  as  to  their  em- 
pire. 

To  make  this  History  the  more  clear,  I  have  found  it  ne- 
cessary to  take  in  within  its  compass  the  affairs  of  all  the 
other  eastern  nations,  as  well  as  those  of  the  Jews,  the  lat- 
ter not  being  thoroughly  to  be  understood  without  the  other  : 
and  as  far  as  the  Grecian  affairs  have  been  complicated  with 
those  of  Persia,  Syria,  or  Egypt,  I  have  been  obliged  to  take 
notice  of  them  also  ;  and,  without  doing  this,  1  could  not 
lead  the  reader  to  so  clear  a  view  of  the  completion  of  those 
prophecies  of  the  Old  Testament  which  I  have  in  the  ensu- 
ing History  explained  :  for  hov«r  could  the  completion  of  the 
prophecy  which  we  have  of  Xerxes,  and  his  stirring  up  of 
all  against  the  realm  of  Grecia,  (Daniel  xi.  2,)  be  understood 
without  having  an  account  of  the  war  which  he  made  against 
Grecia  ?  Or  how  could  the  fulfilling  of  the  prophecies  which 
were  delivered  of  Alexander,  his  swift  victories,  and  his 
breaking  by  them  the  power  of  Persia,  (Dan.  vii.  6  ;  viii.  5, 
G,  21  ;  X.  20;  and  xi.  3,  4,)  be  brought  into  a  clear  light, 
without  laying  before  the  reader  the  whole  series  of  those 
wars  whereby  it  was  effected  ?  Or  how  could  the  verification  of 
the  prophecies  concerning  the  fo^ir  successors  of  Alexander, 
written  by  the  same  prophet,  (Dan.  viii.  8  ;  and  xi,  4,)  be 
fullyevidencedwithoutgivinga  thorough  narrative  of  all  those 
transactions  and  wars,  whereby  it  was  brought  to  pass,  that 
the  empire  of  that  great  conqueror  was  at  length  divided 
among  four  of  his  chief  commanders  ?  The  instance  given  in 
these  particulars  may  serve  to  satisfy  the  reader  as  to  all  the 
rest. 

To  make  all  things  the  easier  to  the  English  reader,  for 
whom  I  chiefly  design  this  work,  I  have  carefully  avoided 
troubling  him  with  any  exotic  words  in  the  text :  and,  where 

Vor,.  [,  1Q 


90  PRfiPAtiE. 

I  have  been  forced,  in  some  places  to  insert  Hebrew  word&> 
I  have  chosen,  for  his  sake,  to  do  it  in  English  letters.  All 
things  else,  that  may  be  above  a  mere  English  reader,  I 
have  referred  to  the  notes  and  quotations  at  the  bottom 
of  the  page ;  and  in  them  I  quote  every  thing  in  English, 
where  the  English  reader  can  examine  what  I  quote,  and 
there  only  where  he  cannot,  are  tliR  references  and  quotations 
in  any  other  language. 

Several  have  in  Latin  written,  by  way  of  annals,  of  the 
times  of  which  I  treat,  as  Torniellus,  Salianus,  Capellus,  and 
others.  But,  above  all  of  this  kind,  are  archbishop  Usher's 
Annals  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament,  which  is  the  exactest 
and  most  perfect  work  of  chronology  that  hath  been  publish- 
ed ;  to  which,  I  acknowledge,  I  have  been  much  beholden  ; 
and  although  I  have  not  always  concurred  with  him,  yet  I 
have,  for  the  most  part,  especially  in  the  ordering  and  set- 
tling the  years  to  which  I  refer  the  actions  that  are  related  ; 
ibr  I  look  on  what  he  hath  done  before  me  herein  to  be  the 
surest  and  safest  clue  I  could  conduct  myself  by,  through  all 
the  intricate  labyrinths  of  ancient  times ;  and  therefore  I 
have  generally  followed  him  in  the  fixing  of  the  years,  except- 
ing only  where  I  saw  very  good  reason  to  do  otherwise. 
But  as  to  the  other  annalists  I  have  n>entioned,  I  have  found 
it  for  the  most  part  loss  of  time  to  consult  them. 

If  I  have  been  too  large  in  my  explication  of  the  prophe- 
cy of  Daniel's  seventy  weeks,  or  in  the  account  which  I  have 
given  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures,  or  in  any  other  discourse  of 
like  nature,  occasionally  intermixed  in  this  work,  the  impor- 
tance of  the  subject  must  be  my  excuse.  For  the  chief  de- 
sign of  this  History,  and  my  main  end  in  writing  it,  being  to 
clear  the  way  to  the  better  understanding  of  the  holy  Scrip- 
tures, both  of  the  Old  and  the  New  Testaments,  I  have 
thought  myself  obliged,  in  the  pursuit  hereof,  to  handle  every 
thing  to  the  full,  as  it  came  in  my  way,  that  might  any  ways- 
tend  hereto.  And  if  the  reader  receiveth  any  benefit  from 
it,  let  him  give  God  the  praise,  who  hath  enabled  me,  under 
a  very  calamitous  and  broken  state  of  health,  to  finish  this 
first  part  of  my  design,  and  still  to  go  on  with  my  studies  for 
the  completing  of  the  other. 

Humphrey  Prideaux. 
^rwich,  Aug,  1,  1715- 


OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS 

CONNECTED,   &c. 


BOOK  1. 

The  ancient  empire  of  the  Assyrians,  which  had  governed 
Asia  for  above  thirteen  hundred  j'ears,  being  dissolved  on 
the  death  of  Sardanapalus,  there  arose  ^  up  two  em- 
pires in  its  stead  ;  the  one  founded  by  Arbaces,  go- 
vernor of  Media,  and  the  other  by  Belesis,  governor  of  Baby- 
lon, who  were  the  tv»^o  principal  commanders  that  headed 
the  conspiracy,  whereby  the  former  empire  was  brought  to 
an  end  ;  which  they  having,  on  their  success,  parted  among 
themselves,  Belesis  had  Babylon,  Chaldea,  and  Arabia,  and 
Arbaces  all  the  rest.  This  happened  in  the  seventh  year 
after  the  building  of  Rome,  and  in  the  second  year  of  the 
eighth  Olympiad,  which  was  the  seven  hundred  and  forty- 
seventh  year  before  Christ,  i.  e.  before  the  beginning  of  the 
vulgar  era,  by  which  we  now  compute  the  years  from  his  in- 
carnation. 

Arbaces  is  in  Scripture  called  ^Tiglath-Pileser  and  '^Thil- 
gath-Pilneser ;  in  •*  Elian,  Thilgamus ;  and  by  *  Castor,  Ninus 
junior.  He  fixed  his  royal  seat  at  Nineva,  the  same  place 
where  the  former  Assyrian  kings  had  their  residence,  and 
there  he  governed  his  new  erected  empire  nineteen  years. 

Belesis  is  the  same  with  Nabonassar,  from  the  beginning 
of  whose  reign  at  Babylon  commenceth  the  famous  astrono- 
mical era,  from  him  called  the  era  of  Nabonassar.  He  is  by 
^  Nicolas  Damascenus  called  Nanibrus,  and  in  the  ^  Holy 
Scripture  Baladan,  being  the  father  of  Merodac  or  Mordac- 
Empadus,  who  sent  an  embassy  to  king  Hezekiah,  to  con- 

a  Diodorus  Siculus,lib.  2.     Atlien£eus,  lib.  12.     Herodotus,  lib.  1.  Juslin, 
lib.  l,c.  3. 
b  2  Kings  xv.  29  ;  &  xxvi.  7,  10.    c  1  Chron.  v.  6,    2  Chron.  xxviii.  20 
d  HisL  Animal,  lib.  12,  c.  21.        e  Euseb.  Chron.  p.  46. 
f  In  Eclogis  Valefii,  p.  420,  Sec.  g  I?a.  xx^sis.  1. 


92  CSNNEXIO.V    OF    THE    HISTORY    Of  [fART  1. 

gratulate  him  on  his  recovery  from  his  sickness ,  which  will 
be  hereafter  spoken  of. 

And  these  two  empires  God  was  pleased  to  raise  up  to  be 
his  instruments  in  their  turns  to  punish  the  iniquities  of  his 
own  people ;  the  first  for  the  overthrowing  of  the  kingdom 
of  Israel,  and  the  other  for  the  overthrowing  of  the  kingdom 
of  Judah;  as  shall  be  shown  in  the  sequel  of  this  history. 

In  the  sixth  year  of  Tiglath-Pileser,  ^  Ahaz  began  to  reign 
over  Judah  ;  who  being  a  very  wicked  and  impious 
Abal^u  prince,  God  stirred  up  against  him  Kezin,  king  of 
Syria,  and  Pekah,  king  of  Israel,  who,  confederating 
together,  invaded  his  land  with  a  great  army,  and  having  ha- 
rassed it  all  over,  pent  him  up  in  Jerusalem,  and  there  be- 
sieged him. 

Tlieir  design  was,  'on  the  taking  of  that  city,  to  have 
wholly  extirpated  the  house  of  David,  and  to  have  set  up  a 
new  king  over  Judah,  the  son  ofTabeal.  Who  this  person 
was,  is  nowhere  said  in  Scripture;  but  he  seemeth  to  have 
been  some  potent  and  factious  Jew,  who,  having  revolted 
from  his  master,  the  king  of  Judah,  excited  and  stirred  up 
this  war  against  him,  out  of  an  ambitious  aim  of  plucking  him 
down  from  his  throne,  and  reigning  in  his  stead. 

But  it  being  the  will  of  God  only  to  punish  Ahaz  for  his 
wickedness,  and  not  the  whole  family  of  David,  for  which  he 
had  always,  for  the  sake  of  David,  expressed  mercy  and  fa- 
vour, he  was  pleased  to  prevent  the  mischief,  by  blasting  the 
whole  design  ;  and  therefore  he  sent  the  prophet  Isaiah  unto 
Ahaz,  to  encourage  him  valiantly  to  withstand  the  enemy  in 
the  defence  of  the  city,  and  to  assure  him  that  they  should 
not  prevail  against  him ;  and  for  this  he  gave  him  two  signs, 
the  one  to  be  accomplished  speedily,  and  the  other  some 
ages  after. 

The  first  was,  that  the  prophet  should  take  him  a  wife, 
who  should  immediately  on  that  marriage  conceive  a  son, 
and  that,  before  that  son  should  be  of  age  to  discern  between 
good  and  evil,  both  these  kings  should  be  cut  off"  from  the 
land  ;  v,'hich  accordingly  came  to  pass  :  for  the  prophet  'im- 
mediately after  taking  a  wife,  before  Maher-shalal-hash-baz, 
the  son  born  to  him  of  that  marriage,  arrived  at  the  age  of 
discerning  between  good  and  evj],  both  these  kings  were 
slain  ;  Rezin  in  the  third  year  of  Ahaz,  and  Pekah  the  next 
yeiir  after. 

The  other  sign  was,  that  °a  virgin  should  conceive,  and 
hear  a  son,  who  should  be  called  Emmanuel,  that  is,  God 
with  us,  the  Messias  that  was  promised,  God  manifested  'n\ 

Z  fsi".  v"!.  14.     Matt.  V  23.  h  2  Kings  xvi.    2  Chroii.  :xxv3ii. 

i  Isa.  vii. 


300K  1.]      THE  OLD  A^'D  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  93 

our  nature,  and  for  a  while  here  dwelling  with  us  to  accom- 
plish the  great  work  of  our  salvation.  Which  prophecy  was 
then  delivered  to  comfort  and  support  the  drooping  and  des- 
ponding spirits  of  the  house  of  David  ;  who  seeing  so  great 
a  force  armed  against  them,  and  intending  their  destruction, 
were  under  terrible  apprehensions,  as  if  their  utter  extirpa- 
tion were  then  at  aand.  From  which  despair  this  prophecy 
fully  relieved  them,  in  assuring  them,  that  their  house  should 
stand,  and  continue,  till  this  prediction  should  be  accom- 
plished, and  the  Messias  born  of  their  race,  in  such  manner 
as  was  hereby  foretold. 

After  this,  the  two  kings,  according  to  the  words  of  the 
prophet,  failing  of  their  design,  were  forced  to  raise  the 
siege,  and  return  home,  without  prevailing  in  the  enterprise 
which  they  had  undertaken. 

But  •'Ahaz,  after  this,  instead  of  being  reformed  by  the 
mercy,  growing  more  wicked  and  perverse  than  before,  ia 
absolutely  rejecting  the  God  of  Israel,  and  cleaving  to  the 
worst  abominations  of  the  heathen  nations  round  him, 
even  to  the  making  of  his  sons  pass  through  the  fire  Ahaz^ll 
to  Molech;  the  next  year  after,  'God  brought  again 
upon  him  the  same  two  confederated  kings,  from  whom  he 
had  delivered  him  the  former  year,  who,  coming  with  forces 
better  appointed,  and  councils  better  concerted  than  before, 
divided  themselves  into  three  armies  ;  the  first  under  Rezin, 
king  of  Syria,  the  second  under  Pekah,  king  of  Israel,,  and 
the  third  under  Zichri,  a  mighty  man  of  Ephraim  ;  and  with 
these  three  armies,  the  more  to  distract  him,  they  invaded 
him  in  three  different  parts  of  his  kingdom  at  the  same  time. 
Rezin,  in  his  ravage,  having  loaded  his  army  with  spoils,  and 
taken  a  vast  number  of  captives,  returned  with  them  to  Da- 
mascus, thinking  it  his  best  interest  there  to  secure  what  he 
had  gotten.  Pekah  with  his  army  marched  directly  against 
Ahaz,  who  had  got  together  the  main  strength  of  his  kingdom 
to  oppose  this  invasion,  and  thereby  for  some  time  did  put  a 
Gtop  to  the  progress  of  this  part  of  the  enemies'  forces ;  but  at 
length  being  encouraged  by  the  departure  of  Rezin  to  give 
them  battle,  he  was  overthrown  with  a  most  terrible  destruc- 
tion, an  hundred  and  twenty  thousand  of  his  men  being  slain 
in  that  day.  Of  which  blow  Zichri  taking  the  advantage,  led 
his  forces  to  Jerusalem,  and  took  the  royal  city,  where  he 
slew  Maaseiah  the  king's  son,  and  most  of  the  chief  gover- 
nors and  great  men  of  the  kingdom  whom  he  found  there. 
And  both  these  armies  of  Israel,  on  their  return,  carried  with 
them  vast  spoils,  and  above  two  hundred  thousand  persons, 

)i  3  Chron.  xsvii,  2—5.  i  2  Kin»s  xvi.    2  Chron.  xxviii. 


94  CONNEXION   OF   THE    HISTORY   OF  [PART  U 

whom  they  had  taken  captive,  with  intention  to  have  sold 
them  for  bondmen  and  bondwomen.  But  a  prophet  from 
God  having  severely  rebuked  them  for  this  (heir  excessive 
cruelty  against  their  brethren,  whom  God  had  delivered  into 
their  hands,  the  elders  of  the  land,  fearing  the  like  wrath  up- 
on themselves  for  the  punishment  hereof,  would  not  permit 
them  to  bring  the  captives  to  Samaria  ;  whereon  they  were 
clothed,  and  relieved  out  of  the  spoils,  and  again  sent  back 
unto  their  own  homes. 

And  the  land  was  no  sooner  delivered  from  these  ene- 
mies, but  it  was  again  invaded  by  others,  who  treated 
Ahaz'^3.  it  with  the  same  cruelty  :  for  the  Edomites  and  the 
Philistines,  who  next  bordered  on  it,  the  former  on 
the  south,  and  the  other  on  the  west,  seeing  Judah  brought 
thus  low,  took  the  advantage  to  seize  on  those  parts  which 
lay  next  unto  him,  and,  by  ravages  and  inroads,  did  all  the 
mischief  to  the  rest  that  lay  in  their  power. 

But  Ahaz,  continuing  still  hardened  in  his  iniquity,  not- 
withstanding all  this  which  he  had  suffered  for  the  punishment 
of  it,  would  not  seek  the  Lord  his  God,  or  return  unto  him 
from  his  evil  ways,  but  putting  his  confidence  rather  in  man, 
pillaged  the  temple  of  all  the  gold  and  silver  that  was  found 
therein,  and  sent  it  to  Tiglath-Pileser  king  of  Ass}ria,  to  en- 
gage him  to  come  to  his  assistance  against  his  enemies,  pro- 
mising thereon  to  become  his  servant,  and  pay  tribute  unto 
him. 

The  king  of  Assyria,  having  an  opportunity  hereby  offer- 
ed unto  him  of  adding  Syria  and  Palestine  to  his  empire, 
readily  laid  hold  of  the  invitation,  and  marched  with  a  great 
army  into  those  parts  ;  where,  having  slain  Rezin  in  battle, 
he  took  Damascus,  and  reduced  all  that  country  under  his 
dominion  ;  and  hereby  he  put  an  end  to  the  kingdom  of  the 
Syrians  in  Damascus,  after  it  had  lasted  there  for  ten  genera- 
tions,that  is,  from  the  time  of  Rezon,  the  son  of  Eiiada,*^ 
who  first  founded  it,  while  Solomon  was  king  over  Israel. 

After  this,  Tiglath-Pileser'  marched  against  Pekah,  and 
seized  all  that  belonged  to  Israel  beyond  Jordan,  and  also  all 
the  land  of  Galilee,  and  then  went  forward  towards  Jerusa- 
lem, but  rather  to  get  more  money  of  Ahaz,  than  to  afford 
him  any  real  help  ;  for  he  assisted  him  not  for  the  recovery 
of  any  of  those  places  which  had  been  taken  from  him  during 
the  war,  either  by  the  Philistines,  Edomites,  or  other  ene- 
mies, but  when  he  had  got  from  him  all  that  he  could,  (for 
the  raising  of  which  Ahaz  cut  the  vessels  of  the  temple  into 
pieces,  and  melted  them  down,)  he  marched  back  to  Damas- 

k  1  Kings  si.  23—25.  I  2  Kings  xvi.    2  Cbron.  xxyiii% 


BOOK  I.J     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  2.j 

GUSj  and  there  wintered,  without  doing  any  thing  more  for 
him ;  so  that,  in  reality,  he  was  rather  distressed,  than  any 
way  helped  by  this  alliance,  the  land  being  almost  as  much 
exhausted  by  the  presents  and  subsidies,  which  were  extorted 
from  him  by  this  his  pretended  friend  and  ally,  as  it  was  by 
the  ravages  and  pillages  of  his  open  enemies.  And,  more- 
over, two  lasting  mischiefs  followed  hereon  :  For,  1st,  histead 
of  two  petty  princes,  whom  he  had  afore  for  his  neighbours, 
and  with  either  of  which  he  was  well  able  to  cope,  he  had 
now  this  mighty  king  for  his  borderer,  against  whom  no 
power  of  the  land  was  sufficient  to  make  any  resistance  ;  and 
the  ill  effect  hereof  both  Israel  and  Judah  did  afterward  suf- 
ficiently feel  ;  for  it  became  at  length  to  both  of  them  the 
cause  of  their  destruction.  2dly,  From  this  time  the  Jews 
were  excluded  all  their  traffic  into  the  southern  sea,  which 
had  hitherto  been  one  of  the  chiefest  foundations  of  their 
riches. 

This  they  had  long  carried  on  through  the  Red  Sen,  and  the 
Straits  of  Babelmandel,  not  only  to  the  coasts  of  Africa  on 
the  west,  but  also  to  those  of  Arabia,  Persia,  and  India,  on 
the  east,  and  reaped  a  prodigious  profit  from  it.  King  David 
was  the  first "^  who  began  it ;  for  having"  conquered  the  king- 
dom of  Edom,  and  reduced  it  to  be  a  province  of  his  empire, 
he  thereby  became  master  of  two  sea-port  towns  on  the  Red 
Sea,  Elath  and  Ezion-Geber,  °  which  then  belonged  to  that 
kingdom ;  and  seeing  the  advantage  which  might  be  made 
of  the  situation  of  these  two  places,  he  wisely  took  the 
benefit  of  it,  and  there  began  this  traffic.  There  are  tAvo 
places  mentioned  in  Scripture,  to  which  it  was  from  thence 
carried  on,  that  is,  Ophir  andTarshish.  From  the  former  of 
these  David  in  his  time  drew  great  profit ;  for  the  three  thou- 
sand talents  of  gold  of  Ophir,  which  he  is  said  ( 1  Chron.  xxix, 
4,)  to  have  given  to  the  house  of  God,  seem  to  be  of  that  gold 
of  Ophir,  which  he  himself  had  by  his  fleets  in  several  voy- 
ages brought  to  him  from  thence :  for  what  he  had  reserved  for 
this  work  out  of  the  spoils  of  war,  the  tributes  of  the  con- 
quered nations,  and  the  public  revenues  of  his  kingdom,  ia 
before  mentioned  (c.  xxiv.  14,)  and  amounted  to^  a  prodigious 

ra  Eupnlemus  apud  Euseb.  Praep.  Evang.  lib.  9. 

n  2  Sam.  viii.  14.     1  Kings  xi.  15,  16.     1  Chron.  xviii.  13. 

o  r  Kings  ix.  26.     2  Cliron.  viii.  17. 

p  Tliis  snm  is  so  prodigious,  as  gives  reason  to  think  that  the  talen(j> 
whereby  that  sum  is  reckoned,  were  another  sort  of  talents  of  a  far  less  value 
than  the  Mosaic  talents,  of  which  an  account  is  given  in  the  Preface.  For 
what  is  said  to  be  given  by  David  (1  Chron.  xxii.  14 — 16,  Si  xxix.  3 — 5,)  and 
contributed  by  his  princes  (xxix.  6 — 8,)  toward  the  building  of  the  tempi* 
at  Jerusalem,  if  valued  by  these  talents,  exceeded  the  value  of  eight  hundred 
millions  of  our  money,  which  wag  enough  wherewith  to  have  built  all  tha'. 
^'?mple  of  ?o1id  silver 


96  CONNEXION  or  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  /. 

sum.  The  three  thousand  talents  of  gold  of  Ophir,  which 
he  added,  was  over  and  above  this,  and  out  of  his  ozon  proper 
goods,  or  private  estate,  which  he  had  besides  what  belonged 
to  him  as  a  king.  And  how  he  could  increase  that  so  far,  as 
out  of  that  only  to  be  able  to  give  so  great  a  sunn,  can  scarce 
any  other  way  be  accounted  for,  than  by  the  great  returns, 
which  were  made  him  from  ihis  traffic:  for  the  gold  alone 
amounted  to''  above  one  and  twenty  millions  of  our  money, 
besides  the  seven  thousand  talents  of  rehned  silver  ■■  silver, 
which  were  included  in  the  same  gift.  After  David  '  Solo- 
,  mon  carried  on  the  same  traffic  to  Ophir,  and  had  from  thence 
in  one  voyage  *  four  hundred  and  fifty  talents  of  gold.  And 
if  Solomon  got  so  much  in  one  voyage,  well  might  David 
have  gained  the  sum  abovementioned,  in  the  several  voyages 
which  were  made  thither  for  him,  from  the  time  that  he  had 
subdued  the  land  of  Edom,  to  the  time  of  his  death,  which  was 
at  least  twenty-five  years.  But  it  must  be  acknowledged,  that 
Solomon  much  improved  this  trade,  not  only  by  his  greater 
wisdom,  but  also  by  his  great  application  to  all  the  business 
of  it.  For,  not  being  perplexed  and  encumbered  with  such 
wars  as  his  father  David  was,  he  had  more  leisure  to  attend 
thereto.  And  therefore,  for  the  better  settling  of  it,  he 
went"  in  person  to  Elath  and  Ezion-geber,  and  there  took 
care  by  his  own  inspection  for  the  building  of  his  ships,  the 
fortifying  of  both  those  ports,  and  the  settling  of  every  thing 
else,  which  might  tend  to  the  successful  carrying  on  of  this  traf- 
fic, not  only  to  Ophir,  but  to  all  other  parts,  where  the  sea^^ 
OB  which  these  ports  lay,  opened  a  passage.  But  his  chiefest 
care  was  to  plant  those  two  towns  with  such  inhabitants,  as 
might  be  best  able  to  serve  him  in  this  design.  For  which 
purpose  he  brought  thither  from  the  sea-coasts  of  Palestine 
as  many  as  he  could  get  of  those  who  had  been  'there  used 
to  the  sea,  especially  of  the  Tyrians,  ^  whom  his  friend  and 
ally  Hiram  king  of  Tyre,  from  thence  furnished  him  with  in 
great  numbers  :  and  these  were  the  most  useful  to  him  in  this 
affair  5  for  they  being  in  those  days,  and  for  many  ages  after, 
the  most  skilful  of  all  others  in  sea  affairs,  they  were  the 
best  able  to  navigate  his  ships,  and  conduct  his  fleets,  through 
long  voyages.      But    the    use    of  the  compass  not   being 

q  For  three  thousand  Hebrew  talents  of  gold,  reduced  to  our  money, 
amount  to  twenty-one  millions  and  six  hundred  thousand  pounds  sterling. 

r  1  Chron.  xxix.  4. 

s  1  Kings  ix.  20—28;  and  x.  11,  22.    2  Chron.  viii.  17,  18  ;  and  10—21. 

t  2  Chron.  viii.  18.  The  450  talents  here  mentioned  amount  to  three  mil- 
lions two  hundred  and  forty  thousand  pounds  of  our  present  sterling  money 

u  2  Chron.  viii.  17. 

■X  1  Kings  ix.  27.    2  Chron.  viii.  IS  ;  and  ix.  10,  3t 


SOOK  I.]  THE  OLD  AXD  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  9T 

then  known,  the  way  of  navigation  was  in  those  times  only 
by  coasting,  which  often  made  a  voyage  to  be  of  three  years, 
which  now  may  be  finished  almost  in  three  months.  However, 
this  trade  succeeded  so  far,  and  grew  to  so  high  a  pitch,  under 
the  wise  management  of  Solomon,  that  thereby  he  drew  to 
these  two  ports,  and  from  thence  to  Jerusalem,  all  the  trade 
of  Africa,  Arabia,  Persia,  and  India,  which  was  the  chief 
fountain  of  those  immense  riches  which  he  acquired, ''  and 
whereby  he  exceeded  all  the  kings  of  the  earth  in  his  time, 
as  much  as  he  did  by  his  wisdom  ;  so  that^  he  made  silver  to 
be  at  Jerusalem  as  the  stones  of  the  street,  by  reason  of  the 
great  plenty  with  which  it  there  abounded  during  his  reign. 
After  the  division  of  the  kingdom,  Edom  being  of  that  part 
which  remained  to  the  house  of  David,  they  still  continued 
to  carry  on  this  trade  from''  those  two  ports,  especially  from 
Ezion-geber,  which  they  chiefly  made  use  of  till  the  time  of 
Jehoshaphat.  But  he  having  there  lost  his  fleet,  which  he 
had  prepared  to  sail  from  thence  to  Ophir  in  partnership 
with  Ahaziah,  king  of  Israel,  this  spoiled  the  credit  of  that 
harbour.  For  there  being  nigh  the  mouth  of  it''  a  ridge  of 
rocks,  as  this  fleet  was  passing  out  of  the  port,  they  were  by 
a  sudden  gust  of  wind,  which  God  sent  on  purpose  for  the 
punishment  of  this  confederacy,  driven  upon  those  rocks, 
where  they  were  all  broken  to  pieces  and  lost."^  And  there- 
fore, for  the  avoiding  of  the  like  mischief  for  the  future,  ihQ 
station  of  the  king's  ships  was  thenceforth  removed  to  Elath, 
from  whence  Jehoshaphat,  the  next  year  after,  sent  out  another 
fleet  for  the  same  place.  Foi  whereas  it  is  said,  that  he  lost 
the  tirst  fleet  for  confederating  with  the  idolatrous  king  of 
Israel,  and  we  are  told  in  another  place''  of  his  sending  forth 
a  fleet  for  Ophir,  in  which  he  would  not  permit  Ahaziah  to 
have  any  partnership  with  him.  This  plainly  proves  the 
sending  out  of  two  fleets  by  Jehoshaphat,  the  first  in  partner- 
ship with  Ahaziah,  and  the  other  without  it.  And  thus  this 
affair  was  carried  on  from  the  time  of  David  till  the  death  of 
Jehoshaphat.  For  till  then  the  land  of  Edom*'  was  all  in  the 
hands  of  the  kings  of  Judah,  and  was  wholly  governed  by  a 
deputy  or  viceroy  there  placed  by  them.  But  when  Jeho- 
ram  succeeded  Jehoshaphat,  and  God,  for  the  punishment  of 
the  exceeding  great  wickedness  of  that  prince,  had  with- 
drawn his  protection  from  him,  Esau,  according  to  the  pro- 

V  1  Kings  X.  23.  2  Chron.  ix.  22. 
3!  1  Kings  \.  27.  2  Chron.  ix.  27. 
a  1  Kings  xxii.  48.     2  Chron.  xx.  36. 

h  Because  of  these  rocks  it  had  the  name  of  Ezion-geber,  which  signified 
Jhe  hack-bone  of  a  man,  for  these  rocks  resembled  it. 
c  1  Kings  xxii.  48.     2  Cliron.  xx.  36,  37. 
d  1  Kings  xxii.  49,  e  1  Kings  xxii.  4  T 


98  CONXEXIOX  OF  THE  MIdTOHV  OF  L'^ART   s^ 

phecy  of  Isaac/  did  break  the  yoke  of  Jacob  from  off  his 
neck,  after  having  served  him  (as  foretold  by  that  prophecy) 
for  several  generations,  that  is,  from  the  time  of  David  till 
then.  For,  on  Jchoratn's  having  revolted  from  God,s  the 
Edoiiiites  revolted  from  him,  and  having  expelled  his  viceroy, 
chose  them  a  king  of  their  own,  and  under  hi^  conduct  re- 
covered their  ancient  liberty,  and  were  not  after  that  any 
more  subject  to  the  kings  of  Judah.  And  from  this  time  the 
Jewish  traffic  through  the  Red  sea  had  an  interruption,  till 
the  reign  of  Uzziah.  But  he,  in  the  very  beginning  of  his 
reign,  having  recovered  Elath  again  to  Judah,''  fortified  it 
anew,  and  having  driven  out  the  Edomites,  planted  it  again 
with  his  own  people,  and  there  renewed  their  old  traflic  ; 
which  was  from  thence  carried  on  and  continued  till  the  reign 
of  Ahaz.  But  then  Kczin,  king  of  Damascus,  having  in  con- 
junction with  Pekah,  king  of  Israel,  oppressed  and  weakened 
Judah  to  that  degree  which  I  have  mentioned,  he  took  the  ad- 
vantage of  it  to  seize  Elath,  and,  driving'  out  the  Jews  from 
thence,  planted  it  with  Syrians,  purposing  thereby  to  draw 
to  himself  the  whole  profit  of  that  traffic  of  the  southern 
seas,  which  the  kings  of  Judah  had  hitherto  reaped,  by 
having  that  port.  But  the  next  year  after  Tiglath-Pileser, 
having  conquered  Rezin,  and  subdued  the  kingdom  of  Da- 
mascus, he  seized  with  it  Elath,  as  then  belonging  to  his  new 
conquest,  and  without  having  any  regard  to  his  friend  and  ally 
king  Ahaz,  or  the  just  claim  which  he  had  thereto,  kept  it 
ever  after,  and  thereby  put  an  end  to  all  that  great  profit, 
which  the  Jews  till  then  had  reaped  from  this  traffic,  and 
transferred  it  to  the  Syrians,  which  became  a  great  diminu- 
tion of  their  wealth :  for  although  they  did  not  always  carry 
it  on  with  the  same  full  gales  of  prosperity,  as  in  the  time  of 
king  Solomon,  yet  it  was  constantly,  as  long  as  they  had  it,  of 
very  great  advantage  to  them  ;  for  it  included  all  the  trade  of 
India,  Persia,  Africa,  and  Arabia,  which  was  carried  on 
through  the  Red  sea.  But  after  Rezin  had  thus  dispossessed 
them  of  it,  they  never  had  it  any  more  restored  to  them, 
but  were  ever  after  wholly  excluded  from  it.  From  thence- 
forth all  the  merchandise  that  came  that  way,  instead  of 
being  brought  to  Jerusalem,  was  carried  elsewhere  ;  but  at 
what  place  the  Syrians  fixed  their  principal  mart  for  it,  while 
it  was  in  their  hands,  is  nowhere  said.  But  at  length  we 
find  the  whole  of  this  trade  engrossed  by  the  Tyrians,  who 
managing  it  from  the  same  port,  made  it,  by  the  way''  of 
Rhinocorura  (a  seaport  town  lying  between  the  confines  of 

i"  Gen.  xxvii.  40.  g  SKings  vjii.  20 — 22. 

h  2Kingsxiv.  22.    2  Chron.  xxvi.  2.     i  2  Kings  xvi.  6.  ^ 
.k  Strabo.  lib.  1«. 


»00K    I.J  IHK  Ol.li   AND   \E>V  T KSTAME\T.-5.  "'•' 

Egypt  and  l\ilestine.)  cenire  all  at  Tyre,  and  tVom  thence 
they  furnished  all  the  western  parts  of  the  world  with  the 
wares  of  Persia,  India,  Africa,  and  Arabia,  which  thus  by 
the  way  of  the  Red  sea  they  traded  to  ;  and  hereby  they  ex- 
ceedingly enriched  themselves  during  the  Persain  empire, 
under  the  favour  and  protection  of  whose  kings  they  had  the 
full  possession  of  this  trade.  But  when  the  Ptolemies  pre- 
vailed in  Egypt,  they  did,  by  building*  Berenice,  Myos- 
Hormos,  and  other  ports  on  the  Egyptian  or  western  side  of 
the  Red  sea  (for  Elath  and  Esion-geber  lay  on  the  eastern,) 
and  by  sending  forth  fleet?  from  thence  to  all  those  countries, 
to  which  the  Tyrians  traded  from  Elath,  soon  drew  all  this 
trade  into  that  kingdom,  and  there  fixed  the  chief  mart  of  it 
at  Alexandia,'"  which  was  therebj^  made  the  greatest  mart  in 
the  world,  and  there  it  continued  for  a  great  many  ages  after, 
and  all  the  traffic,  which  the  western  parts  of  the  world  from 
that  time  had  with  Persia,  India,  Arabia,  and  the  eastern 
coasts  of  Africa,  was  wholly  carried  on  through  the  Red  sea, 
and  the  mouth  of  the  Nile,  till  a  way  was  found,"  a  little 
above  two  hundred  years  since,  of  sailing  to  those  parts  by 
the  way  of  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope.  After  this  the  Por- 
tuguese for  some  time  managed  this  trade ;  but  now  it  is  in 
a  manner  wholly  got  into  the  hands  of  the  English  and 
Dutch.  And  this  is  a  full  account  of  the  East-India  trade, 
from  the  time  it  was  first  begun  by  David  and  Solomon  to 
our  present  age. 

But  though  it  be  by  all  agreed,  that  the  trade  to  Ophir  and 
Tarshish  was  the  same  that  is  now  in  the  hands  of  our  East- 
India  merchants,  yet  there  are  great  disputes  among  learned 
men  in  what  parts  of  the  eastern  world  these  two  places  lay. 
Some  will  have  Ophir  to  have  been  the  island  of  Zocatora, 
which  lies  on  the  eastern  coasts  of  Africa,  a  little  without  the 
straits  of  Babelmandel.  Others  will  have  it  to  be  the  island 
anciently  called  Taprobana,  now  Ceylon;  and,  for  its  being 
an  island,  they  have  the  authority  of  Eupolemus  (an  ancient 
author  quoted  by  Eusebius)  on  their  side  :  for  speaking  of 
David,  he  saith  of  him,"  '  That  he  built  ships  at  Elath,  a  city 
of  Arabia,  and  from  thence  sent  metal-men  to  the  island  of 
Urphe,  or  Ophir,  situated  in  the  Red  sea,  which  was  fruitful 
in  yielding  abundance  of  gold,  and  the  metal-men  brought  it 
from  thence  to  Judea.'  But  this  beitig  a  question  no  way  to 
be  decided  but  from  the  Scriptures,  all  that  is  to  be  observed 
from  thence  is,  1st,  That  from  Elath  to  Tarshish  was  a  voy- 
age P  of  three  years,  going  and  coming  ;  but  in  what  compass 

I  Strabo,  lib.  IT. 
m  Strabo,  lib.  17,  p.  79S.  n  A.  I).  1497. 

'J  Apnd  Euseb.  Prp^p.  Evang.  lib.  9.     p  1  Kings  x,  22.    2  Chron.ix.  2*- 


100  «';ONNEXIt)\    OF    THE    HI«TORV    OK  [PART    /. 

of  time  the  voyage  to  Opbir  was  completed  is  uot  said  ;  find 
that  therefore  Tarshish  might  be  somewhere  in  the  East-In- 
dies, hut  Ophir  might  be  any  where  nearer  home  within  the 
reach  of  tiiose  seas.  2dly,  Tliat  the  commodities  brought 
from  Tarshish  were''  "'gold,  and  silver,  and  ivory,  and  apes, 
and  peacocks;"  and  those  of  Ophir ■"  "were  gold,  and  al- 
mug  trees,  and  precious  stones."  And  therefore  any  place 
in  the  Southern  or  great  Indian  sea,  at  the  distance  of  a  thea 
three  years  voyage  from  Elatli,  which  can  best  furnish  the 
merchants  with  gold,  silver,  ivory,  apes,  and  peacocks,  may 
be  guessed  to  be  the  Tarshish  of  the  holy  Scriptures  ;  and 
any  place  within  the  compass  of  the  same  Southern  sea,  that 
can  best  furnish  them  with  gold,  almug  trees,  and  precious 
stones,  and  in  that  quantity  of  gold  as  Solopnon  brought  home 
in  one  voyage,  may  be  guessed  to  be  the  Ophir  in  the  said 
holy  Scriptures  mentioned.  Only  thus  much  I  cannot  for- 
bear to  say,  that  if  the  southern  part  of  Arabia  did  furnish 
the  world  in  those  times*  with  the  best  gold,  and  in  the 
greatest  quantity,  as  good  authors  say,  they  that  would  have 
the  Ophir  of  the  holy  Scriptures  to  be  there  situated,  seem, 
of  all  others,  to  have  the  best  foundation  for  their  conjecture. 
But  more  than  conjecture  no  one  can  have  in  this  matter. 

But,  for  the  better  understanding  of  what  Eupolemus 
above  saith  of  Ophir,  '  that  it  was  an  island  in  the  Red  sea,' 
it  is  proper  here  to  take  notice,  that  he  doth  not  there  mean 
the  Arabian  gulf,  which  lieth  between  Arabia  and  Egypt,  and 
is  now  commonly  called  the  Red  sea  ;  but '  the  great  South- 
ern ocean,  which,  extending  itself  between  India  and  Africa, 
washeth  up  to  the  coast  of  Arabia  and  Bersia,  where  it  ap- 
pearing of  a  reddish  colour,  by  reason  of  the  fierceness  of 
the  sunbeams  constantly  beating  upon  it  in  that  hot  climate, 
it  was  therefore  called  the  Red  sea  ;  and  this  alone  was  that 
which  was  truly  and  properly  called  so  by  the  ancients:  for 
the  Arabian  gulf,  which  hath  now  obtained  that  name,  was 
never  for  any  such  redness  of  it  so  called  ;  for  neither  the 
water  (as  some  will  have  it)  nor  the  sand  (as  others  say)  hath 
there  any  appearance  of  that  colour,  nor  was  it  ever  by  any 
of  the  easterns  formerly  so  called.     Throughout  the  whole 

q  1  Kings  x.22.  r  1  Kings  x.  11. 

s  Agatharcides,  (p.  60,  edit.  Oxon.)  tells  us,  that  the  Alileans  and  Cassan- 
diians  in  the  southeiii  parts  of  Arabia,  had  gold  in  tiiat  plenty  among  thera, 
that  they  would  give  donhle  the  weight  of  gold  for  iron,  treple  its  weight  for 
brass,  and  ten  times  its  weight  for  silver,  and  that,  in  digging  the  earth,  thev 
lound  it  in  goblets  of  pure  gold,  which  needed  no  refining,  and  that  the  least 
of  them  were  a.^  liigas  olive  stones,  but  others  much  larger.  No  otherauthor 
speaks  of  any  other  place  in  tlie  world  where  it  was  ever  found  in  the  like 
plenty. 

t  Diouysii  Periegesis,  v.  38,  and  Comment.  Eustathii  in  eundcm.  Slraho. 
lib.  16.  p.  765.     Agatliemeri  Geographia,  lib.  2,  c.  11. 


i;OOK    T.J  THE    OLD    ANU    N'KVT    TESTAMKNTS.  JO! 

scripture  of  the  Old  Testament"  it  is  called  Yam  Supli,thaf! 
is,  the  Weedy  Sea,  by  reason  of  the  great  quantity  of  sea- 
weed which  is  therein  ;  and  the  same  name  it  also  hatb  in 
the  ancient  Syriac  version,  as  well  as  in  the  Targum  or  Chal- 
dea  paraphrases.  But,  among  the  ancient  inhabitants  of 
the  countries  adjoining,  it  was  called  Yam  Edom,  ?.  e.  the 
Sea  of  Edom  :  for  the  sons  of  Edom  having  possessed  all 
that  country,  which,  lying  between  the  Red  sea  and  the 
Lake  of  Sodom,  was  by  the  Greeks  called  Arabia  Petrea. 
they  then  named  it,  from  their  father  Edom,  the  land  of 
Edom  ;  and  because  that  which  we  now  call  the  Red  sea 
washed  upon  it,  thence  it  was  called  the  sea  of  Edom,  or,  in 
the  dialect  of  the  Greeks,  the  Edomean  or  Idumean  sea,  in 
the  same  manner  as  that  which  washeth  upon  Pamphylia  was 
called  the  Pamphylian  sea,  and  that  which  washeth  upon 
Tyrrbenia  the  Tyrrhenian  sea,  and  so  in  abundance  of  other 
instances.  But  the  Greeks,  who  took  this  name  from  the 
Phoenicians,  finding  it  by  them  to  be  called  Yam  Edom,  in- 
stead of  rendering  it  the  sea  of  Edom,  or  the  Idumean  sea, 
as  they  ought,  mistook  the  word  Edom  to  be  an  appellative 
instead  of  a  proper  name ;  and  therefore  rendered  it  i^vf^tt 
e»kx<!-(rx,  that  is,  the  Red  sea ;  for  Edom,  in  the  language  of 
that  country  signified  red  ;  and  it  is  said  in  Scripture,  that 
Esau*  having  sold  his  birthright  to  his  brother  Jacob  for  a 
mess  of  red  pottage,  he  was  for  that  reason  called  Edom, 
that  is,  the  red.  And  Strabo,"  Pliny,^  Mela,*  and  others,  *> 
say,  that  this  sea  was  called  so,  not  from  any  redness  that  was 
in  it,  but  from  a  great  king,  called  Erythrus,  who  reigned  in 
(he  country  adjoining  upon  it ;  which  name  Erythrus,  signi- 
fying the  same  in  Greek  that  Edom  did  in  the  Phoenician  and 
Hebrew  languages,  that  is,  the  red,  this  plainly  proves  that 
the  great  king  Erythrus  could  be  none  other  than  Edom,  who 
having  planted  his  posterity  in  the  country,  as  I  have  said,*^ 
from  him  it  was  called  the  land  of  Edom,  or,  with  a  Greek 
termination,  Edomea,  or  Idumea,  and  from  that  land  the  sea 
which  washed  upon  it  was  called  the  sea  of  Edom  ;  but  the 
Greeks  translating  Edom  as  an  appellative  into  the  word  red, 
which  it  signified,  instead  of  rendering  it  in  the  same  sound, 
as  a  proper  name ;  from  this  mistake  it  was  by  them  called 
the  Red  sea,  and  that  name  it  hath  retained  ever  since. 

But  fully  to  clear  what  hath  been  above  said,  it  is  neces- 
sary farther  to  observe,  that  the  idumea  mentioned  by  Stra- 
ti See  Exod.  x.  19;  lii.  18,  k.c.  x  Gen.  xxv.  30. 
V  Lib.  16.  p.  766.  z  Lib.  6,  c.  23  a  Lib.  3,  c.  8. 
b  Agatharcides,  edit.  Ox.  p.  2.  Q.  Curtias,  lib.  8,  c.  9,  &t  lib.  10,  c.  1.  Phi- 
lostrattis,  lib.  3,  c.  15.  Arriaiius  in  Rerum  Iiidicarum  libro,  p  579,  edit.  Blanc, 
c  See  Fuller's  Miscellanies,  lib.  4,  c,  20. 


'l{)2  «;ONNEXI0K    OK    THK    HISTORY    OK  [PART    I. 

bo,  Josephus,  Pliny,  Ptolemy,  and  other  ancient  writers,  was 
not  that  land  of  Edom,  or  Idumea,  which  gave  name  to  the 
Red  sea,  but  another  ancient  Idumea,  which  was  vastly 
larger  than  that  Idumea  which  those  authors  describe  ;  for  "^ 
it  included  all  that  laud,  which  was  afterward,  from  Petra, 
the  metropolis  of  it,  called  Arabia  Petrea :  for  all  this  was 
inhabited  by  the  sons  of  Edom,  and  from  thence  it  was 
anciently  called  the  land  of  Edom.  But,  ®  on  a  sedition 
which  arose  among  them,  a  party  going  off  from  the  rest, 
while  the  land  of  Judea  lay  desolate  during  the  Babylonish 
captivity,  they  planted  themselves  on  the  south-western  part 
of  that  country,  where  they  were  called  Idumeans  ;  and  that 
land  alone  which  they  there  possessed  was  the  Idumea  which 
those  authors  mention.  Those  who  remained  behind,  join- 
ing themselves  to  the  Ishmaelites,  were,  from  Nebaioth,  or 
Nabath,  the  *^  son  of  Ishmael,  called  Nabathseans,  and  the 
country  which  they  possessed  Nabathea  ;  and  by  that  name 
we  often  hear  of  them  in  the  ancient  Greek  and  Latin  wri- 
ters. 

But  to  return  from  whence  I  have  digressed,  Ahaz,  having 
gone  so  far  with  Tiglath-Pilcser,  as  hath  been  said, 
Ab'ai^l!  found  it  necessary  for  him  to  overlook  all  injuries  to 
avoid  provoking  greater ;  and  therefore,  carrying  on 
the  compliment  towards  him  as  if  he  had  really  been  that 
friend  and  protector,  which  he  pretended  to  be  as  soon  as  he 
heard  that  he  was  returned  to  Damascus,  ^  he  went  thither  to 
him,  to  pay  him  that  respect  and  obeisance,  which,  after 
having  owned  him  as  his  protector  and  sovereign,  he  did 
now,  as  his  client  and  tributary,  owe  unto  him. 

While  he  was  at  Damascus  on  this  occasion,  •>  he  saw  there 
an  idolatrous  altar,  of  a  form  which  he  was  much  pleased 
with  ;  whereupon,  causing  a  pattern  of  it  to  be  taken,  he 
sent  it  to  Urijah,  the  high-priest,  at  Jerusalem,  to  have 
another  there  made  like  unto  it ;  and,  on  his  return,  having 
removed  the  altar  of  the  Lord  out  of  its  place  in  the  temple, 
ordered  this  new  altar  to  be  set  up  in  its  stead  ;  and  thence- 
forth giving  himself  wholly  up  to  idolatry,*  instead  of  the 
God  of  Israel ;  he  worshipped  the  gods  of  the  Syrians,  and 
the  gods  of  the  other  nations  round  him,  saying,  that  they 
helped  their  people,  and  that  therefore  he  would  worship 
them,  that  they  might  help  him  also.  And  accordingly, 
liaving  tilled  Jerusalem  and  all  Judea  with  their  idols  and 
their  altars,  he  would  sutler  no  other  god,  but  them  only,  to 

d  That  it  readied   to   tlie  Red    sea   appears  from    2  Chron.  viii.   17  :  f<ji- 
Klath  and  Ezion-geber.  cities  of  Edom,  were  ports  on  the  Red  sea. 
e  Strabo,  lib,  lli,  p.  TOO.  f  Gen.  xxv.  13. 

g  2  Kings  xvi.  10.  h  2  Kings  xvi.  10—16. 

i  2  Kings  xvi.     2  Cjiron.  xx viii.  22 — 2-x 


liOOK  I.]  THE  OLD  AMi  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  L(iJ 

be  worshipped  in  the  land  ;  whereby,  having  excluded  the 
only  true  God,  the  Lord  his  Creator,  whom  alone  he  ought 
to  have  adored,  he  caused  his  temple  to  be  shut  up,  and  ut- 
terly suppressed  his  worship  throughout  all  his  kingdom. 
And  this  he  did  with  an  air  and  profession  of  anger  and  de- 
fiance, for  that  he  had  not  delivered  him  in  his  distress,  when 
the  Syrians  and  Israelites  came  against  him,  as  if  it  were  in 
his  power  to  revenge  himself  upon  the  Almighty,  and  execute 
iijs  wrath  upon  him  that  made  him  ;  to  such  an  extravagant 
height  of  folly  and  madness  had  his  impiety  carried  him  be- 
yond all  that  had  reigned  before  him  in  Jerusalem  :  and  in 
this  he  continued,  till  at  length  he  perished  in  it,  being  cut 
off  in  the  flower  of  his  age,  before  he  had  outlived  half  his 
days. 

Tiglath-Pileser,  on  his  return  into  Assyria,  carried  with 
him  great  numbers  of  the  people,  whom  he  had  taken  captive 
in  the  kingdom  of  Damascus,  and  in  the  land  of  Israel.  Those 
of  Damascus  he  planted ''  in  Kir,  and  those  of  Israel '  in  Halah, 
and  Habor,  and  Hara,  and  on  the  river  Gozan  in  the  land 
of  the  Modes.  Kir  was  a  city  in  the  hither  part  of  Media; 
but  Halah,  Habor,  Hara,  and  the  river  Gozan,  were  farther 
remote.  And  herein  was  accomplished  the  prophecy  of  the 
prophet  Amos™  against  Israel,  wherein  he  foretold,  in  the 
days  of  Uzziah,  the  grandfather  of  Ahaz,  that  God  would  cause 
them  to  go  into  captivity  beyond  Damascus,  that  is,  unto 
places  beyond  where  those  of  Damascus  should  be  carried. 
St.  Stephen,"  quoting  this  prophecy,  renders  it  beyond  Ba- 
bylon. So  the  common  editions  of  the  Greek  Testament 
have  it,  and  it  is  certainly  true  ;  for  what  was  beyond  Kir 
was  also  beyond  Babylon,  for  Kir  was  beyond  Babylon  :  but 
Wicelius's"  edition  hath  Damascus  in  St.  Stephen's  speech 
also,  and,  no  doubt,  he  had  ancient  copies  which  he  follow- 
ed herein. 

The  planting  of  the  colonies  by  Tiglath-Pileser,  in  those 
cities  of  the  Medes  plainly  proves  Media  to  have  been  then 
under  the  kmg  of  Assyria  :  for,  otherwise,  what  had  he  to  do 
to  plant  colonies  in  that  country  :  and  therefore  Tiglath-Pi- 
leser and  Arbaces  were  not  two  distinct  kings,  whereof  one 
had  Media,  and  the  other  Assyria,  as?  archbishop  Usher  sup- 
poseth,  but  must  both  be  the  same  person  expressed  under 
these  two  distinct  names.  Aud^  Diodorus  Siculus  positively 
tells  us,  that  Arbaces  had  Assyria,  as  well  as  Media,  for  his 
share  in  the  partition  of  the  former  empire  ;  and  therefore 

k'2  Kiogs  xvi.  9.  1  1  Chron.  v.  26. 

m  Amos  v.  26,  27.  n  Acts  vii.  43. 

o  See  Dr.  Mill's  Greek  Testament,  Acts  vii.  43. 
p  Annales  Veteris  Testamenli.  su>>  anno  Mundi  32-57.  q  Lib,  2 


J04  CONNEXION -OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I, 

there  is  no  room  for  a  Tiglath-Pileser,  or  a  Ninus  junior, 
distinct  from  him,  to  reign  in  Assyria  during  his  lime,  but 
it  must  necessarily  be  one  and  the  same  person,  that  was 
signitied  by  all  these  different  names. 

Pekah,  by  this  conquest  which  the  Assyrians  made  upon 
him  being  stript  of  so  large  a  part  of  his  kingdom,  was  here- 
by brought  lower  than  he  had  afore  brought  king  Ahaz.  For 
he  had  now  scarce  any  thing  left,  but  the  city  of  Samaria, 
and  the  territories  of  the  tribe  of  Ephraim,  and  the  half 
tribe  of  Manasseh  only  ;  which  bringing  him  into  contempt 
with  his  people,  as  well  as  raising  their  indignation  against 
him  (as  is  commonly  the  case  of  unfortunate  princes)  Hoshea, 
the  son  of  Elah,*^  rose  up  against  him,  and  slew  him,  after  he 
had  reigned  in  Samaria  twenty  years  ;  and  hereby  was  fully 
accomplished  that  prophecy  of  Isaiah^  concerning  him, 
which  is  above  related.  After  this  the  elders  of  the  land 
seem  to  have  taken  the  government  into  their  hands  ;  for 
Iloshea  had  not  the  kingdom  till  nine  years  after,  that  is,  to- 
wards the  end  of  the  twelfth  year  of  Ahaz. 

In  the  fourteenth  year  of  Ahaz  died  Tiglath-Pileser,  king 
of  Assyria,  after  he  had  reigned*  nineteen  years;  and 
An- 629.  Salmaneser,  his  son,  (who  in  "  Tobit  is  called  Enemes- 
ser,  and  in '  Hosea,  Shalmon,)  reigned  in  his  stead. 
And,  as  soon  as  he  was  settled  in  the  throne,  he  came  into 
Syria  and  Palestine,  and  there  subjected  Samaria  to  his  do- 
minion, making  Hoshea,  the  king  thereof,  to  become  his 
vassal,  and  pay  tribute  unto  him.  Jn  this  expedition,  among 
other  prey  which  he  took  and  carried  away  with  him, "  was 
the  golden  calf,  which  Jeroboam  had  set  up  in  Bethel,  and 
had  been  there,  ever  since  his  time,  worshipped  by  the  ten 
tribes  of  Israel,  that  had  revolted  with  him  from  the  house  of 
David.  The  other  golden  calf,  which  was  at  the  same  time 
set  up  by  him  in  Dan,  had  been  taken  thence,*  about  ten 
vears  before,  by  Tiglath-Pileser,  in  the  invasion  which  he  then 
made  upon  Galilee,  in  which  province  that  city  stood.  And 
therefore  the  apostate  Israelites,  being  now  deprived  of  the 
idols  which  they  had  so  long  worshipped,  began  again  to  re- 
turn to  the  Lord  their  God,  and  to  go  up  to  Jerusalem  there 
to  worship  before  him  ;  and  Hoshea  encouraged  them  herein. 
For  whereas  y  the  kings  of  Israel  had  hitherto  maintained 
guards  upon  the  frontiers  to  hinder  all  under  their  subjection 
fvori  going  up  to  Jerusalem  to  worship  there,  Hoshea  took 

r  2  Kings  XV.  30.  s  Isa.  vii.  16. 

t  Castor  apud  Easeb.  Chron.  p.  46, 

n  Chap.  i.  2.  v  Chap.  %.  14. 

w  Seder  Olam  Rabba.  c.  xxii. 

\  2  Kings  xvii.  v  Seder  Olam  Rabba,.  c.  22. 


BOOK  I.J      THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TEStAMBNTS.  106 

away  those  guards,  and  gave  free  liberty  to  all  to  worship  the 
Lord  their  God  according  to  his  laws,  in  that  place,  which  he 
had  chosen  ;  and  therefore  when  Hezekiah  invited  all  Israel, 
that  is,  all  those  of  the  ten  revolted  tribes,  as  well  as  the  other 
two,  to  come  up  to  his  passover,  Hoshea  hindered  them  not,^ 
but  permitted  all  that  would  to  go  up  thereto.  And  when 
those  of  his  subjects,  who  were  at  that  festival,  did,  on  their 
return,  out  of  their  zeal  for  the  true  worship  of  their  God,^ 
break  in  pieces  the  images,  cut  down  the  groves,  demolish  the 
high  places,  and  absolutely  destroyed  all  other  monuments  of 
idolatry  throughout  the  whole  kingdom  of  Samaria,  as  will  be 
hereafter  related,  Hoshea  forbade  them  not,  but  in  all  likeli- 
hood gave  his  consent  to  it,  and  concurred  with  them  herein. 
For  he  being  king,  without  his  encouraging  it,  and  giving 
his  authority  for  it,  it  could  not  have  been  done.  And  there- 
fore he  hath,  as  to  religion,  the  best  character  given  him  in 
Scripture  of  all  that  reigned  before  him  over  Israel  from  the 
division  of  the  kingdom.  For  although  he  were  not  perfect  in 
the  true  worship  of  God,  and  therefore  it  is  said  of  him,''  that 
"he  did  evil  in  the  sight  of  the  Lord,"  yet  it  is  subjoined,  in 
the  next  words,  "  but  not  so  as  the  kings  of  Israel  which  were 
before  him."  By  which  it  appears,  that  his  ways  were  less 
offensive  to  God,  than  were  the  ways  of  any  of  those  that  had 
reigned  before  him  in  that  kingdom.  However,  still  he  was 
far  from  being  perfectly  righteous,  which  this  alone  sufficiently 
proves,  that  he  treacherously  slew  his  master  to  reign  in  his 
stead. 

Ahaz,  in  the  sixteenth  year  of  his  reign,  being  smitten  of 
God  for  his  iniquities,*^  died  in  the  thirty-sixth  year 
of  his  age,  and  was  buried  in  the  city  of  David,  but  muele^r 
not  with  a  royal  burial,  in  the  sepulchres  of  the  kings. 
For,  from  this  honour  he  was  excluded,  because  of  his  wicked 
reign,  as  were  Jehoram  and  Joash  before  him,  and  Manasseh 
and  Amon  after  him,  for  the  same  reason  ;  it  being  the  usage 
of  the  Jews  to  lay  this  mark  of  infamy  upon  those  that  reigned 
wickedly  over  them. 

After  Ahaz  reigned  '^  Hezekiah  his  son,  a  very  worthy  and 
religious  prince.  He  had,  in  the  last  year  of  his  father's  reign, 
been  admitted  a  partner  with  him  in  the  kingdom,  while  he 
was  languishing  (as  it  may  be  supposed)  under  the  sickness 
of  which  he  died.  However,  as  long  as  his  father  lived  he 
could  make  no  alteration  in  that  evil  course  of  affairs,  which 
he  had  put  both  church  and  state  into.  But,  as  soon  as  he 
was  dead,  and  Hezekiah  had  the  whole  power  in  his  hands,  he 

z  2  Chron.  xxx.  10,  18.  a  2  Chron.  xxxi.  1. 

b  2  Chron.  ixvii.  2.  c  2  Kings  xvi.  20.  2  Chron.  xxviii.  27. 

d  2  Kings  xviii.    2  Chron,  sxix. 


106  CONNEXION   Oi'  THE  MISTORT  «F  [PART  I. 

immediately  set  himself  with  all  his  might  to  work  a  thorough 
reformation  itiboth. 

The  fust  thing  which  he  did  was  to  open  the  house  of  God, 
which  his  father  had  impiously  shut  up,  and  restore  the 
neJk.\true  worship  therein;  in  order  whereto  he  called  the 
priests  and  Levites  together,  out  of  all  parts  of  the  land, 
to  attend  their  duly  in  the  temple,  ordering  them  to  remove 
his  father's  new  allar.  and  to  restore  the  altar  of  the  Lord  to 
its  place  again,  and  purge  the  temple  of  all  other  pollutions, 
with  which  it  had  been  profaned  during  the  reign  of  his  father. 
But  it  not  being,  till  the  end  of  the  former  year,  that  Ahaz 
died,  the  beginning  of  the  tirst  month  of  the  ensuing  year, 
(which  is  called  Nisan,  and  corresponds  partly  with  March, 
and  partly  with  April,  in  our  calendar,)  was  the  soonest  that 
they  could  be  employed  in  this  work;  so  that  it  not  being 
completed  till  the  sixteenth  day  of  that  month,  the  passover 
could  not  be  kept  that  year  in  its  regular  time,  which  ought 
to  have  been  begun  on  the  fourteenth  day  of  the  said  mouth 
ofNisan. 

However,  the  house  of  the  Lord  being  now  sanctified,  and 
made  fit  for  the  service  of  God,  Hezekiah  went  up  thither  on 
the  seventeenth  day  of  that  month,  with  the  rulers  and  great 
men  of  his  kingdom,  where,  the  people  being  gathered  to- 
gether, he  offered  sin-offerings  for  the  kingdom  and  the 
sanctuary,  and  for  Judah,  to  make  atonement  to  God  for  them 
and  for  all  Israel ;  and  after  that  he  offered  peace-offerings, 
and  in  all  other  particulars  restored  the  service  of  God  in  the 
same  manner  as  it  had  been  performed  in  the  purest  times 
that  had  been  before  him ;  and  there  was  great  joy  among  all 
the  good  people  of  the  land  thereon. 

And  seeing  the  passover  could  not  be  kept  on  the  regular 
time  this  year,  because  neither  the  temple,  nor  the  priests,  nor 
the  people,  were  sanctified  in  order  hereto,  and  in  this  case^ 
the  law  of  Moses  allowed  a  second  passover  to  be  kept  from 
the  fourteenth  day  of  the  second  month  ;  king  Hezekiah, 
having  taken  counsel  hereon  with  the  chief  priests,  and  his 
princes,  and  all  the  congregation  in  Jerusalem,  ^  decreed,  that 
this  second  passover  should  be  kept  by  all  the  congregation 
of  Israel,  instead  of  the  first ;  and  accordingly  he  sent  messen- 
gers to  carry  notice  hereof,  not  only  through  all  Judah,  but 
also  through  all  the  other  tribes  of  Israel,  and  to  invite  all 
that  were  of  Israel,  to  come  to  it.  And  accordingly,  on  the 
day  appointed,  there  was  at  Jerusalem  a  very  great  concourse 
of  people  from  all  parts  met  together  to  solemnize  the  holy 
festival,  and  that  as  well  from  those  tribes  that  had  separated 

e  Numb,  is   10, 11.  (  2  Cbren.  sxs 


BOOK  I.j       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTA MF^NTS.  107 

iVom  the  house  of  David,  as  from  those  who  had  stuck  to  it : 
for  although  many  of  Ephraim  and  Manassch,  and  the  rest  of 
those  tribes,  laughed  at  Hezekiah's  messengers,  when  they  in- 
vited them  to  this  solemnity,  because  of  the  impious  contempt 
which  through  long  disusage  they  had  contracted  of  it ;  yet  a 
great  multitude,  even  from  those  parts,  came  to  it,  and  very 
religiously  joined  in  the  observance  of  it,  whereby  it  became 
the  greatest  passover  that  had  been  solemnized  at  Jerusalem 
since  the  days  of  king  Solomon.  And.  because  they  had  long 
neglected  the  observance  of  this  solemn  festival,  to  make 
some  amends  for  it,  they  now  doubled  the  time  of  its  continu- 
ance ;  for,  whereas  the  law  directs  it  to  be  observed  only 
seven  days,  they  kept  it  fourteen,  with  much  joy  and  gladness 
of  heart;  and,  resolving  from  thenceforth  to  serve  the  God 
of  Israel  only,  as  soon  as  the  solemnity  was  ended,  they  went 
out  into  all  the  coasts  of  Judah  and  Benjamin,  and  brake  the 
images  in  pieces,  and  cut  down  the  groves,  and  threw  down 
the  high  places  and  the  altars,  and  absolutely  destroyed  all 
the  monuments  of  idolatry  which  were  any  where  to  be  found, 
either  in  Jerusalem.  Judea,  or  any  of  the  coasts  belonging 
thereto.  And  those  of  the  other  tribes,  on  their  return  home, 
did  the  same  in  all  the  rest  of  Israel ;  so  that  the  true  worship 
of  God  was  again  universally  restored  throughout  all  the  land, 
and  they  might  have  received  a  blessing  proportionable 
hereto,  had  they  with  the  same  zeal  persisted  in  it. 

And  the  brazen  serpent,  which  Moses  had  set  up  in  the 
wilderness,  having  been  by  many,  in  the  preceding  times  of 
iniquity,  made  the  object  of  idolatrous  worship,  ^  Hezekiah 
caused  this  also  to  be  destroyed  ;  whereas,  otherwise,  it  might 
have  served,  as  well  as  the  pot  of  manna,  and  Aaron's  rod,  to 
have  been  a  monument  of  the  miraculous  mercy  of  God, 
shown  to  his  people  on  their  coming  out  of  Egypt,  and  for 
this  reason  it  seems  to  have  been  so  long  preserved. 

But,  notwithstanding,  it  is  thus  positively  said  in  the  holy 
Scripture,  that  the  brazen  serpent  was  destroyed  by  Hezekiah 
in  the  manner  as  I  have  related  ;  yet  the  impudence  of  the 
Romanists  is  such,  ^  that  in  the  church  of  St.  Ambrose  at 
Milan,  they  now  keep  and  show  to  their  devotees  a  brazen  ser- 
pent, which  they  pretend  to  be  the  very  same  that  Moses 
did  set  up  in  the  wilderness ;  and  upon  this  belief,  an  idola- 
trous devotion  is  there  paid  to  it,  as  gross  as  was  that  of  the 
Jews,  for  which  Hezekiah  caused  it  to  be  destroyed.     But  it 

g  2  Kings  xviii.4. 
h  Vid.  SigODi  historiam  de  regno  Italiae,  lib.  7.    Torniellum  in  Analibus 
sub  A.  Mo  3315,  torn.  2,  p.  105.    Buxtorfii  historiam  serpentis  aenei.  cap. 
fi.kr. 


108  CONNEXION  OF  THE   HISTORY  OK  [fARl    i- 

must  not  be  denied,  that,  amoniithoir  learned  men,  there  are 
those  who  acknowledge  tin;  cheat,  and  disclaim  it. 

About  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of  Hezekiah,'  Sabaconj 
the  Ethiopian,  having  invaded  Egypt,  and  taken  Boccharis, 
the  king  of  that  country,  prisoner,  caused  him  with  great  cru- 
elty to  be  burnt  alive,  and  then  seizing  his  kingdom,  reigned 
there  in  his  stead.  This  is  the  same,  who  in  Scripture  is 
calledJ  So.  And  he  having  thus  settled  himself  in  Egypt,  and 
after  some  time  grown  very  potent  there,  Hoshea,  king  of  Sa- 
maria, entered  into  confederacy  with  him,  hoping  by  his  as- 
sistance to  shake  off  the  yoke  of  Assyria;  and,  in  confidence 
hereof,  he  withdrew  his  subjection  from  Salmaneser,  and 
would  pay  him  no  more  tribute,  nor  bring  any  more 
ue'zek\  prcscnts  unto  him,  as  he  had  formerly  used  every  year 
to  do.  Whereon  "^  Salmaneser,  in  the  beginning  of  the 
fourth  year  of  Hezekiah,  marched  with  an  army  against  him, 
and  having  subdued  all  the  country  round,  pent  him  up  in  Sa- 
maria, and  there  besieged  him  three  years ;  at  the  end  of 
which  he  took  the  city,  and  thereon  putting  Hoshea  in  chains, 
he  shut  him  up  in  prison  all  his  days,  and  carried  the  people 
into  captivity,  placing  them  in  Halah,  and  in  Habor, 
HLzek.'v.  3'^^  ^^  the  other  cities  of  the  Medes,  where  Tiglath- 
Pileser  had  before  placed  those  whom  he  had  carried 
into  captivity  out  of  the  same  land. 

In  this  captivity,'  Tobit,  being  taken  out  of  his  city  of 
Thisbe,  in  the  tribe  of  Naphtali,  was,  with  Anna  his  wife,  and 
Tobias  his  son,  carried  into  Assyria,  where  he  became  pur- 
veyor to  king  Salmaneser.  But  the  rest  of  his  brethren  were 
carried  into  Media,  as  is  above  said,  and  planted  there,  as  par- 
ticularly were  Gabael  in  Rages,  and  Raguel  in  Ecbatana, 
which  proves  Media  to  have  been  still  under  the  king  of 
Assyria,  and  that  there  was  no  king  in  Media  in  those  davs 
distinct  from  the  king  of  Assyria. 

There  is,  in  the  15th  and  16th  chapters  of  Isaiah,  a  verv 
terrible  prophecy  against  Moab,  bearing  date  in  the  first  year 
of  Hezekiah  ;  wherein  it  was  foretold,  that  within  three  years 
Arne  and  Kir-Harasheth,  the  two  principal  cities  of  that  coun- 
try, should  be  destroyed,  and  all  the  rest  of  it  brought  to  con- 
tempt, ruin,  and  desolation  ;  which  must  have  been  executed 
the  same  year  that  Samaria  was  first  besieged.  It  seemeth 
most  likely,  that  Salmaneser,  to  secure  himself  from  any 
disturbance  on  that  side,  first  invaded  Moab  ;  and,  having  de- 
stroyed these  tv,o  cities,  brought  all  the  rest  of  that  countrv 

i  Hf-rodot.  lib.  2.   .\friLaii.''ainid  Cynccllum,  p.  74.     Euseb.  in  Chronic 
j  2  Kings  xvli.  4.  '  ^  o  Kings  xvjii. 

i  Tobit,  chap.  1 


BOOK  I.J  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMEXTS.  109 

under  his  subjection,  and  placed  garrisons  therein,  sufficient 
to  put  a  stop  to  all  incursions  of  the  Arabs,  which  might  that 
way  be  made  upon  him,  before  he  would  begin  that  siege  ;  for, 
otherwise,  he  could  not  have  been  able  to  carry  it  on  with 
success. 

In  the  same  year  that  Samaria  was  taken,'"  Mardoc-Empa- 
dus  began  his  reign  at  Babylon.  He  was  the  son  of  Belesis, 
or  Baladin,  or  Nabonassar  (for  by  all  these  names  was  he 
called,)  and  was  the  same,"  who  in  Scripture  is  called  Me- 
rodach-Baladan,  the  son  of  Baladan.  But,  after  the  death 
of  his  father,  several  other  princes  had  succeeded  in  Babylon 
before  the  crown  came  to  him.  For  "Nabonassar  dying 
when  he  had  sat  in  the  throne  fourteen  years,  after  him 
reigned  Nadeus  two  years;  and  after  him  Chinzerus  and  Po- 
rus  Jointly  tive  years  ;  and  then  after  them  J  ugjeus  five  years. 
But  01  these  there  being  nothing  on  record  besides  their 
names  in  the  canon  of  Ptolemy,  we  have  not  hitherto  taken 
any  notice  of  tbem.  After  Jugasus  succeeded  Mardoc-Em- 
padus,  in  the  twenty-seventh  year  after  the  beginning  of  his 
father's  kingdom  in  Babylon,  and  reigned  twelve  years. 

While  Salmaneser  was  engaged  in  the  siege  of  Samaria, 
Hezekiah  took  the  opportunity  of  recovering  what  had  been 
lost  from  his  kingdom  in  the  reign  of  his  father.  And  there- 
fore,P  making  war  upon  the  Philistines,  he  not  only  regained 
all  the  cities  of  Judah,  which  they  had  seized  during  the 
time  that  Pekah  and  Rezin  distressed  the  land,  but  also  dis- 
possessed them  of  almost  all  their  own  country,  exceptinc; 
Gaza  and  Gath. 

As  soon  as  the  siege  of  Samaria  was  over,  Salmaneser 
sent  to  Hezekiah  to  demand  the  tribute,  which  Ahaz 
had  agreed  to  pay  for  the  kingdom  of  Judea,  in  the  H^zek^s! 
time  of  Tiglath-Pileser,  his  father;  but ''Hezekiah 
trusting  in  the  Lord  his  God,  would  not  hearken  unto  him  ; 
neither  did  he  pay  him  any  tribute,  nor  send  any  presents  unto 
him  ;  which  would  immediately  have  brought  Salmaneser 
upon  him  with  all  his  power,  but  that  he  was  diverted  by 
another  war. 

For'^Elulaeus,  king  of  Tyre,  seeing  the  Philistines  brought 
low  by  the  war  which  Hezekiah  had  lately  made  upon  them, 
laid  hold  of  the  opportunity  of  reducing  Gath  again  under 
his  obedience,  which  had  some  time  before  revolted  from 
him.  Whereupon  the  Gittites,  applying  themselves  to  Sal- 
maneser, engaged  him  in  their  cause;  so  that  he  marched 
Avith  his  whole  army  against  the  Tyrians.     Whereupon,  Si- 

in  Canon  Plolemaji.  u  Isa.  xssix.  1.  o  Canon  Ptolemsi 

p  2  Kings  xviii.  8.     Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  9,  c.  13.  q  2  Kings  xviii.  7. 

r  Annates  Menandri  apnd  .Tosephum  Antiq.  liV)  9.  c.  14.  el  rop.tra  Ap' 
pionero,  lib.  1. 


I  10  CONNEXION  OS"  THE  HI5TORV  Oi*  [PART  I, 

don,  ^ce,  (afterward  called  Ptolemais,  and  now  Aeon,)  and 
the  other  nianlime  towns  of  Phajnicia,  which  till  then  had 
been  subject  to  the  T)rians,  revolted  from  them  and  submit- 
ted to  Salmaneser.  But  the  Tyrians  having,  in  a  sea  fight, 
with  twelve  ships  onl},  beattin  the  Ass} rian  and  Phoenician 
fleets  both  joined  together,  which  consisted  of  sixt^  ships, 
this  ^ave  them  such  a  reputation  in  naval  atiairs,  and  made 
their  name  so  terrible  in  this  sort  of  war,  that  Salmnneser 
would  not  venture  to  cope  with  them  any  mon;  at  sea  ;  but 
turn.ng  the  war  into  a  siege,  left  an  arm}  to  block  up  the 
cit),  and  returried  into  ss)ria.  The  forces  which  he  left 
thert  much  distressed  the  place,  hy  stopping  their  aqueducts, 
and  cutting  ofi  all  the  conveyances  of  water  to  them.  To 
reheve  themselve^  in  this  exigency,  thty  digged  wells,  from 
whence  they  drew  up  the  water,  and  by  the  help  of  them 
held  out  five  yi'ars;  at  the  end  of  which  Salmaneser 
UeiekAs.  dying,  this  delivered  them  for  that  time.  But  they 
being  over  puffed  up  with  this  success,  and  growing 
very  insolent  hereon,  this  provoked  that  prophecy  against 
them  in  the  twenty-third  chapter  of  Isaiah,  which  foretold 
the  miserable  overthrow  that  should  afterward  happen  unto 
them ;  and  was  accordingly  effected  by  Nebuchadnezzar, 
king  of  Babylon,  as  will  be  hereafter  shown. 

In  the  ninth  year  of  Hezekiah,  died  Sabacon,  or  So.  king 
of  Egypt,  after  he  had  reigned  in  that  country 'eighc  years, 
and  Sevechus, '  his  son,  whom  Herodotus"  calleth  Sethon, 
reigned  in  his  stead. 

Salmaneser,  king  of  Assyria,  being  dead,  after  he  had 
reigned  fourteen  }ears,  Sennacherib''  his  son  suc- 
HMek.^14.  ceeded  him  in  the  kingdom,  and  reigned  about  eight 
years.  He  is  the  same  whom  the  prophet  Isaiah 
(eh.  XX.  1,)  called  Sargon.  As  soon  as  he  was  settled  in  the 
throne,  he  renewed  the  demand  which  his  father  had  made 
upon  Hezekiah  for  the  tribute,  which  Ahaz  had  agreed  to  pay 
in  the  reign  of  Tiglath-Pileser,  his  grandtather  ;  and,^  on  his 
refusal  to  comply  with  him  herein,  denounced  war  against 
him,  and  marched  with  a  great  army  into  Judea  to  fall  upon 
him.  This  was  in  the  fourteenth  year  of  the  reign  of  king 
Hezekiah. 

In  this  samt"  year, '  Hezekiah,  falling  sick  of  the  pestilence, 
had  a  message  from  God,  by  tbe  prophet  Isaiah,  to  set  his 
house  in  order,  and  prepare  for  death  ;  buN  on  his  hearty 
prayer  to  God,  he  obtained  another  message  from  him,  by 

s  Africanus  apud  Syncellum  p.  74.  t  Africanus.  p.  74. 

11  Africanus  lib.  2.  v  Tobit  i.  16. 

w  2  Kings  xviii.     2  Chron.  xxiii.     Isa.  ixivi. 
:t  2Kin?s  xx.  2  Chron.  \i(W.  24    Isi.  xxxviii 


BOOK  I.J      THE  OLD  AM»  MEW  TESTAMENTS.  Ill 

the  same  prophet,  which  promised  him  life  for  fifteen  years 
longer,  and  also  deliverance  from  the  Ass}'rians,  who  were 
then  comint^  against  him  :  and,  to  give  him  thorough  assu- 
rance httreof  by  a  miraculous  sign,  God  did,  at  his  request, 
make  the  sun  go  backward  ten  degrees  upon  the  sun-dial  of 
Ahaz.  And,  accordingi},  a  lump  of  hgs  having  been,  b}  (he 
prophet's  direction,  made  into  a  plast'.-r.  and  laid  to  the  pesti- 
lential bile,  he  recovered  withtn  ihree  davs,  at.d  went  up  to 
the  house  of  God,  to  return  thanks  unto  him  for  so  wonder- 
ful a  deliverance. 

Merodach-Baladan,  king  of  Babylon  (the  same  who  in 
Ptolemx's  canon  is  called  M.tnioc-Empadus)  hearing  of  this 
miraculous  recovery,''  sent  ambassadors  uuto  him,  to 
congratulate  him  hereon  ;  which  Hizekiah  was  much  jleiel'^is. 
pleased  with.  Their  coming  on  this  occasion  seem- 
eth  principally  to  have  been  foj-  two  reasons.  The  first  to 
inquire  about  the  miracle  of  ihe  sun's  retrogradation,  (for 
the  Chaldeans,  being  above  all  other  nations  then  given  to 
the  study  of  astronomy,  were  very  curious  m  their  inquiries 
after  such  matters  ;)  and  the  other,  to  enter  into  an  alliance 
with  him  against  Sennacherib,  whose  growing  power  the  Ba- 
bylonians had  reason  to  fear,  as  well  as  the  Jews.  And  to 
make  the  Babylonians  put  the  greater  value  upon  his  alliance 
on  this  account,  seems  to  be  the  reason  that  Hezekiah  showed 
those  ambassadors  from  them  all  the  riches  of  his  house,  his 
treasures,  his  armoury,  and  ail  his  stores  and  strength  for  war. 
But  by  this  he  having  expres^ed  the  vanity  and  pride  of  his 
mind,  God  sent  him,  by  the  prophet  Isaiah,  a  rebuking  mes- 
sage for  it,  and  also  a  prophecy  of  what  the  Babylonians 
should  afterward  do  unto  his  family,  in  order  to  the  humbling 
of  that  pride,  with  which  his  heart  was  then  elated. 

Towards  the  end  of  ihe  fourteenth  year  of  Hezekiah's 
reign,  ^  Sennacherib  cam<' up  with  a  great  arm>  against  the 
fenced  cities  of  Judah,  and  took  seieral  of  them,  and  laid 
siege  to  Lachish,  threatening  Jerusaleat  itself  next.  Where- 
on Hezekiah,  taking  advice  of  his  princes  and  chief  counsel- 
lors, made  all  manner  of  preparations  for  its  defence  ;  re- 
pairing the  walls,  and  making  new  ones,  where  they  were 
wanting,  and  fortifying  them  with  towers,  and  all  other  works 
and  buildings,  necessary  for  their  defence.  And  he  provi- 
ded also  darts  and  shields  in  great  abundance,  and  all  other 
arms  and  artillery,  which  might  be  any  wa>  useful  for  the 
defending  of  the  place,  and  the  annoying  of  the  enemy  on 
their  coming  against  it.  And  he  caused  all  the  people  to  be 
enrolled  and  marshalled  for  the  war,  that  were  fit  and  able 

y2Kingsxs.  Isa.  xxxix. 
'<3  2  Kings  XX.    2  Chron.  xxxii.    Isa.  xxxvi. 


"i  ItJ  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART  I. 

for  it;  placing  over  them  captains  of  experience,  to  instruct 
thenn  in  all  military  exercises,  and  to  conduct  and  lead  them 
forth  against  the  enem),  whenever  there  should  be  an  occa- 
sion for  it.  And  he  took  care  also  to  stop  up  all  the  wells, 
that  were  without  the  walls  of  Jerusalem,  for  a  great  compass 
round  the  city,  and  diverted  all  brooks  and  watercourses 
from  coming  that  way  ;  thereby  to  distress  the  enemy  for 
want  of  water,  should  they  come  and  set  dow!i  b;;fore  that 
place.  And  flirther,  to  strengthen  himself  the  more  against 
so  potent  and  formidable  an  enemy,  he  entered  into  alliance 
with  the  king  of  Higypl  for  their  mutual  defence.  But  *  the 
prophet  Isaiah  coudemtied  this  alliance,  as  carrying  with  it 
a  distrust  in  God,  telling  the  Jews,  that  they  should  confide 
in  him  alone  for  their  deliverance,  who  would  himself  come 
down  to  fight  for  Mount  Zion,  and  deliver  and  preserve  Je- 
rusalem from  the  power  of  the  enemy  that  was  then  risen 
up  against  it :  and  that  whatsoever  trust  they  should  place  in 
Egypt,  should  all  come  to  nothing,  and  be  of  no  benefit  to 
them,  but  rather  turn  to  their  shame,  their  reproach,  and 
their  confusion  ;  and  so  in  the  event  it  accordingly  happened. 
However,  Sennacherib  being  informed  of  all  these  prepa- 
rations, which  Hezekiah  had  made  for  his  defence,  and  per- 
ceiving thereby  how  difficult  a  work  it  would  be  to  take  so 
strong  a  city,  when  so  well  appointed,  and  provided  for  its 
defence,  he  became  inclined  to  hearken  to  terms  of  accom- 
modation ■,  and  therefore,  on  Hezekiab's  sending  to  treat  with 
him,  it  was  agreed,  that  Hezekiah  paying  unto  him**  three 
hundred  talents  of  silver,  and  thirty  talents  of  gold  for  the 
present,  and  duly  rendering  his  tribute  for  the  future,  there 
should  be  peace.  But  when  Sennacherib  had  received  the 
money,  he  had  little  regard  to  this  agreement,  but  soon  after 
broke  it,  and  again  renewed  the  war  as  will  be  hereafter 
shown.  However,  for  the  present,  he  gave  him  some  respite, 
and  marched  against  Egypt ;  and,  the  better  to  open  his  way 
into  that  country,*'  he  sent  Tartan,  one  of  his  generals,  before 
him  to  take  Ashdod,  or  Azotus  :  from  the  taking  of  which 
place,  the  prophet  Isaiah  dates  the  beginning  of  the  war 
which  Sennacherib  had  with  the  Egyptians ;  wherein,  ac- 
cording as  that  prophet''  had  foretold,  he  much  afflicted  that 
people  three  years  together,  destroying  their  cities,  and 
carrying   multitudes  of  them  into  captivity.     At  that  time 

a  Isa.  XXX.  xxxi. 

(i  An  Hebrew  talent,  according  to  Scripture,  Exod.  xxxviii.  25 — 27,  con- 
laiuing  tbree  thousand  shekels,  and  every  shekel  being  three  shillings  of  our 
money,  these  three  hundred  talents  of  silver  must  contain  of  our  money, 
one  hundred  and  thirty-five  thousand  pounds,  and  the  thirty  talents  of  gold, 
two  hundred  and  sixteen  thousand  pounds.  So  the  whole  sum  here  paid  by 
Hezekiah  amounted  to  three  hundred  fifty-one  thousand  pounds  of  our  money. 

'•- 1«9.  XT.  li  r1  Isn,  XX.  3,  4.     -Joyephus  Anfin.  lib.  10.  c,  1. 2 


BOOKI.j      THE  OLD  AND  NKW  TESTAMEN'TS.  113 

Sevechus,  the  son  of  Sabacon,  or  So,  the  Ethiopian,  was  king 
of  Egypt,  whom  Herodotus*  calls  Sethon,  and  represents  him 
as  a  prince  of  so  foolish  a  conduct,  as  was  most  hkely  to  bring 
such  a  calamity  upon  his  kingdom,  whensoever  it  should  be 
assaulted  by  an  enemy.  For,  affecting  the  office  of  a  priest, 
he  neglected  that  of  a  king,  and  causing  himself  to  be  conse- 
crated chief  pontiff  of  Vulcan,  gave  himself  wholly  up  to 
superstition  ;  and,  having  no  regard  to  the  warlike  defence 
of  his  kingdom,  he  so  far  neglected  and  discouraged  the  mili- 
tary order  which  was  there  maintained  for  it,  that  he  took 
from  them  their  tenures,  which,  in  the  time  of  the  former 
kings,  his  predecessors,  had  been  allowed  them  for  their  sup- 
port ;  which  gave  them  such  a  just  cause  of  offence  and  in- 
dignation against  him,  that,  when  he  had  need  for  their  valour 
on  this  occasion,  they  would  not  fight  for  him  ;  whereon  he 
was  forced  to  raise  an  army  of  such  raw  and  inexperienced 
men  as  he  could  get  out  of  the  shopkeepers,  tradesmen,  la- 
bourers, and  such  like  people  ;  which  being  wholly  unable  to 
cope  with  such  an  army  of  veterans  as  Sennacherib  brought 
against  them,  he  did  with  great  ease  overrun  the  country, 
and  work  what  devastation  in  it  he  pleased.  And  at  this 
time  seems  to  have  been  brought  upon  No-Amon,  a  famous 
city  in  Egypt,  that  destruction  which  the  prophet  Nahum 
speaks  of  (chap.  iii.  10,)  where  he  tells  us  that  her  inhabit- 
ants were  carried  into  captivity,  her  young  children  dashed 
in  pieces  in  the  top  of  her  streets,  and  her  great  men  divided 
by  lot  among  the  conquerors,  and  put  into  chains,  to  be  led 
away  as  slaves  and  captives.  All  which,  he  tells  us,  hap- 
pened, while  Egypt  and  Ethiopia  were  her  strength,  which 
plainly  points  out  unto  us  this  time,  when  an  Ethiopian  prince 
reigned  over  Egypt.  Sabacon,  or  So,  the  father  of  Seve- 
chus, was  an  Ethiopian,  who  made  himself  king  of  Egypt  by 
conquest ;  and  therefore,  during  his  and  his  son's  reign, 
Egypt  and  Ethiopia  were  as  one  country,  and  they  mutually 
helped  each  other,  an  instance  whereof  will  not  be  wanting 
in  this  war. 

No-Amon  in  Egypt  was*^  the  same  with  Thebes,  famous 
for  its  hundred  gates,  and  vast  numbers  of  inhabitants. 
The  Greeks  called  it  Diospolis,  or  the  city  of  Jupiter,  be- 
cause of  a  famous  temple  built  there  to  Jupiter;  and  for  the 
same  reason  was  it  called  No-Amon  by  the  Egyptians,  for 
Amon  was  the  name  of  Jupiter  among  that  people. 

It  is  to  be  observed,  that  the  destruction  of  No-Amon, 
mentioned  in  Nahum,  must  have  been  some  time  before  that 
of  Nineveh  ;  for  the  former  is  historically  related  by  him  as 

«  Herod,  lib.  2  f  Vide  Bochart.  Phaleg.  part  1,  lib.  I,  c.  1. 

Vol,  I,  15 


114  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OP  [pAUT  I^ 

past,  and  the  other  only  prophetically  foretold  as  to  come; 
and  therefore  Nineveh,  having  been  destroyed  in  the  twenty- 
ninth  year  of  Josiah,  as  will  hereafter  be  shown,  this  destruc- 
tion of  No-Amon  must  have  been  long  before,  and  in  no  time 
more  likely  than  when  Sennacherib  made  this  war  upon 
Egypt,  and  harassed  it  from  one  end  to  the  other,  for  three 
years  together.  They  who  refer  this  destruction  of  No- 
Amon,  spoken  of  by  Nahum,  to  the  invasion  of  Nebuchad- 
nezzar, place  it  after  the  destruction  of  Nineveh,  and  thereby 
make  one  part  of  the  text  inconsistent  with  the  other. 

But  Sennacherib  did  not  end  this  war  with  the  same  suc- 
cess as  he  began  it ;  for,  having  laid  siege  to  Pelusium,^  and 
spent  much  time  in  it,  he  was  at  length  forced  to  break  up 

from  thence,  and  retreat  out   of  Egypt,  because  of 
fie'zek^is.  Tirhakah,  king  of  Ethiopia  :  for  he  being  come  into 

Egypt  with  a  great  army  to  help  Sevechus,  his  kins- 
man, was  on  a  full  march  toward  Pelusium,  to  relieve  the 
place,  which  Sennacherib  hearing  of,  durst  not  abide  his 
coming,  but  raised  the  siege,  and  returning  into  Judea,  en- 
camped again  at  Lachish,''  where  he  renewed  the  war  with 
Hezekiah,  notwithstanding  the  agreement  of  peace  which  he 
had  afore  made  with  him  ;  and,  to  let  him  know  as  much,  he 
sent  Tartan,  Rabsaris,  and  Rabshakeh,  three  of  his  principal 
captains,  with  that  proud  and  blasphemous  message,  which 
we  have  at  full  recited  in  two  places  of  the  holy  Scripture.' 
It  was  delivered  to  the  king's  officers,  from  under  the  vsralls 
of  Jerusalem,  in  the  hearing  of  all  the  people,  and  in  the 
Hebrew  tongue  :  for  they  hoped  thereby  to  draw  the  people 
to  a  revolt;  but  they,  failing  of  success  herein,  returned  ta 
Sennacherib  without  their  design.  The  person  appointed 
to  deliver  this  message  was  Rabshakeh,  who,  by  his  ready 
speaking  of  the  Hebrew  tongue,  seems  to  have  been  an  apos- 
tate Jew,  or  else  one  of  the  captivity  of  Israel.  By  office 
he  was  the  king'schief  cup-bearer,  as  his  name  imports.  On 
their  return,  they  found  Sennacherib  decamped  from  Lachish, 
and  laying  siege  to  Libnah ;  where,  hearing  that  Tirhakah, 
on  his  finding  him  gone  from  Pelusium,  was  marching  after 
him,  as  in  pursuit  of  one  flying  from  him,  he  led  forth  his 
army  against  him,  and  gave  him  a  great  overthrow ;  for  it 
was  from  God,  by  the  prophet  Isaiah,*^  before  laid  as  a  burden 
upon  Egypt,  and  as  a  burden  upon  Ethiopia,  thus  to  be 
punished  by  him,  and  he  was  no  more  than  as  God's  execu- 
tioner herein.     But,  before  he  went  forth  to  this  last  war,Vhe 

g  Joseph,  antiq.lib.  10,  c.  1. 

h  2  Kings  xviii.  17,  18,  &c.    2  Cliroii.  xxxii.  9,  lO,  fcc.     Isaiah  xxsvi. 

i  2  Kings  xviii.  19,  20,  &.c.     Isaiah  xxxvi.  4,  5,  &.c. 

Ife  Isai&h  s,viii.  and  jx,        \  Isaiah  xxxvii.    2  Kings  xix.  3  Chron.  xxxii. 


-BOOK  I.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  116 

sent  again  to  Hezekiah,  adding  a  most  blasphemous  letter  to 
his  former  message,  defying  therein,  both  him,  and  also  the 
Lord  his  God,  in  a  most  impious  manner  ;  which  justly  pro- 
voked the  wrath  of  God  against  him,  to  that  degree,  as 
brought  a  most  dismal  destruction  upon  him,  to  t!ie  cutting 
off  of  almost  all  his  army  :  for  when,  swelling  with  his  fresh 
victory  over  the  Ethiopians,  he  was  on  his  full  march  toward 
Jerusalem,  with  thorough  purpose  utterly  to  destroy  that 
place,  and  all  in  it,  an  angel  of  the  Lord  went  forth,  and  in 
one  night,  smote  in  the  camp  of  the  Assyrians  an  hundred 
fourscore  and  five  thousand  men  ;  so  that,  when  he  arose  in 
the  morning,  he  found  almost  all  his  army  dead  corpses  ;  with 
which  being  terrified,  he  fled  out  of  Judea  in  great  confusion, 
and  made  all  the  haste  he  could  back  again  to  Nineveh, 
where  he  dwelt  all  the  remainder  of  his  life  in  dishonour, 
shame,  and  regret.  This  happened  in  the  eighteenth  year 
of  king  Hezekiah,  and  four  years  after  Sennacherib  first 
came  into  those  parts.  After  this,  Hezekiah  reigned  the  rest 
of  his  time  in  great  peace  and  prosperity,  being  feared  and 
honoured  by  all  the  nations  round  him,  by  reason  of  the  fa- 
vour which  they  saw  he  had  with  the  Lord  his  God,  in  the 
great  and  wonderful  deliverance  which  he  had  vouchsafed 
unto  him  :  so  that  none  of  them,  after  this,  would  any  more 
lift  up  their  hand  against  him. 

The  Bab)  lonish  Talmud  hath  it,  that  this  destruction  upon 
the  army  of  the  Assyrians  was  executed  by  lightning;  and 
some  of  the  Targums  arc  quoted  for  saying  the  same  thing. 
But  it  seemeth  most  likely,  that  it  was  effected  by  bringing 
on  them  the  hot  wind  which  is  frequent  in  those  parts, ""  and 
often,  when  it  lights  among  a  multitude,  destroys  great  num- 
bers of  them  in  a  moment,  as  it  frequently  happens  in  those 
vast  caravans  of  Mahometans  who  go  their  annual  pilgrim- 
ages to  Mecca.  And  the  words  of  Isaiah,  "  which  threatened 
Sennacherib  with  a  blast,  that  God  would  send  upon  liim. 
seem  to  denote  this  thing. 

Herodotus"  gives  us,  from  the  relation  of  the  Egyptian 
priests,  some  kind  of  a  disguised  account  of  this  deliverance 
from  the  Assyrians  in  a  fabulous  application  of  it  to  the  city 
of  Pelusium,  instead  of  Jerusalem,  and  to  Sethon,  the  Egyp- 
tian king,  instead  of  Hezekiah;  by  whose  piety  he  saith  it 
was  obtained,  that  while  the  king  of  Assyria  laid  siege  to 
Pelusium,  a  great  number  of  rats  were  miraculously  sent  into 
his  army,  which  in  one  night  did  eat  all  their  shield-straps, 

m  Thevenot's  Travels,  part  2,  book  1,  c.  20,  &  p.  2,  b.  2,  c.  16,  &  p.  1.  b.  2. 
c.  20.  This  wind  is  by  the  prophet  Jeremiah,  ch.  li.  1,  called  "  A  destroying 
wind,"  where  the  Arabic  version  renders  it,  "  An  hot  pestilential  wind. ' 

n  Isainh  xxxvii.  7.    2  K'ms,s  six.  7.  o  Lib.  1 


116  CGNNEXIOiN  OF  THE   HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

quivers,  and  bow-strings  ;  so  that,  on  their  rising  the  next 
morning,  finding  themselves  without  arms  for   the  carrying 
on  of  the  war,  they  were  forced  to  raise  the  siege  and  begone. 
.And  it  is  particularly  to  be  remarked,   that  Herodotus  calls 
the  king  of  Assyria,  to  whom  he  saith  this  happened,  by  the 
same  name  of  Sennacherib,  as  the  Scriptures  do,  and  the  time 
in  both  doth  also  well  agree  :  which  plainly  shows,   that  it  is 
the  same  fact  that  is  referred  to  by  Herodotus,  although  much 
disguised  in   the  relation  ;  which   may   easily  be  accounted 
for,  when  we  consider  that  it  comes  to  us  through  the  hands 
of  such  as  had  the  greatest  aversion  both  to  the  nation  and 
the  religion  of  the  Jews,  and  therefore  would  relate  nothing 
in  such  a  manner  as  might  give  any  reputation  to  either. 
After  this  terrible  blow,  and  the  loss  of  so  great  an  army, 
Sennacherib  was  so  weakened,  that  he  had  no  way  of 
^^J°f,2.  again  recovering  himself ;  which  making  him  to  fall 
into  contempt  among  his  subjects,  several  of  his  pro- 
vinces revolted  from  him,  and  particularly  Media,  which  was 
the  largest  and  the  most  considerable  of  all  his  empire. 

For  the  IMedes,  when  they  heard  in  how  low  a  condition 
he  was  returned  to  Nineveh,  immediately  shook  off  his  yoke, 
and  set  up  for  themselves,  ^'m  n  sort  of  democratical  govern- 
ment: but  soon  growing  sick  of  the  confusions  which  this 
caused  among  them,  they  were  forced  to  have  recourse  to 
monarchy  for  the  remedy,  and  the  next  year  after  chose 
Deioces  for  their  king,  whom  Ihcy  had  formerly  made  great 
use  of  as  a  common  arbitrator  of  their  differences,  and,  for 
the  great  proof  which  he  had  given  of  his  justice  and  abilities 
on  such  occasions,  they  advanced  him  to  this  dignity.  He 
began  his  reign  in  the  nineteenth  year  of  king  Hezekiah  ; 
and  having  repaired,  beautified,  and  enlarged  the  city  of 
Ecbatana,  he  made  it  the  royal  scat  of  his  kingdom,  and 
reicned  there  with  great  wisdom,  honour,  and  prosperity, 
fifty-three  years;  during  which  time,  it  growing  to  be  a  great 
city,  he  is  for  this  reason  reckoned  by  the  Greeks  to  have 
been  the  founder  of  it. 

The  same  year  Arkianus  began  his  reign  at  Babj  Ion,** 
after  the  decease  of  RIardoch-Empadus,  or  Merodach-13ala- 
dan,  who  ended  his  life  with  the  former  year,  after  having 
reigned  over  the  Babylonians  twelve  years. 

Sennacherib,  after  his  leturn  to  Isineveh,  being  inflamed 
with  rage  for  his  great  loss  and  disappointment,  as  if  he  would 
revenge  himself  upon  his  subjects  for  it,  grew  thenceforth'' 
very  cruel  and  tyrannical  in  the  management  of  his  govern- 
ment, especially  toward  the  Jews  and  Israolitcs.  abundance 

p  lIpro(iotU5  liV>.  1.  q  Canf.  Ptol.  r  Tnl)i(  i.  18 


BOOK  1.]       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  1  IT 

of  whom  be  caused  every  day  to  be  slain  and  cast  into  tbe 
streets  :  by  which  savage  humour  having  made  himself  so  in- 
tolerable, that  he  could  be  no  longer  borne  by  his  own  family, 
his  two  eldest  sons,^  Adramclech  and  Sharazer,  conspired 
against  him,  and  falling  upon  him  while  he  was  worshipping 
in  the  house  of  Nisroch,  his  god,  they  there  slew  him  with 
the  sword  ;  and  thereon  having  made  their  escape  into  the 
land  of  Armenia,  Esarhaddon,  his  third  son,  reigned  in  his 
stead.  Some  commentators*  will  have  it,  that  he  had  vowed 
to  sacrifice  these  his  two  sons  to  appease  his  gods,  and  make 
them  the  more  favourable  to  him  for  the  restoration  of  his 
affairs,  and  that  it  was  to  prevent  this  that  they  thus  sacrificed 
him.  But  for  this  there  is  no  other  foundation,  but  that  scarce 
any  thing  else  can  be  thought  of  which  can  affbrd  any  excuse 
for  so  wicked  and  barbarous  a  parricide. 

Esarhaddon  began  his  reign  over  Assyria  about  the  twenty- 
second  year  of  king  Hczekiah,  which  was  the  last  of  the 
reign  of  Sevechus,  or  Sethon,  in  the  kingdom  of 
Egypt;  who  dying  after  he  had  reigned  fourteen  HeiJkfs:. 
years,"  was  succeeded  by  Tirhakah,  the  same  who 
came  with  the  Ethiopian  army  to  his  help.  He  was  the 
third  and  last  of  that  race  that  reigned  in  Egypt. 

In  the  twenty-third  year  of  Hezekiah,  Arkianus  dying  with- 
outissue,  there  followed  an*  interregnum  of  two  years 
in  ihe  kingdom   of  Babylon,  before  they  could  agree  u^iek%. 
upon  a  successor.     At  length  Belibus,^  being  advan- 
ced to  the  throne,  sat  in  it  three  years.     After  him  succeed- 
ed Apronadius,^  and  reigned  six  years. 

The  same  year  that  Apronadius  began  his  reign  at  Babylon, 
Hezekiah  ended  his  at  Jerusalem  :  for  he  died  there,^'  after  he 
had  reigned  twenty  and  nine  year? ;  and  all  Judah 
and  Jerusalem  did  honour  at  his  death;  for  they  bu- H"ie^if^o9 
ried  him,  with  great  solemnit}.  in  the  chiefest  and 
highest  place  of  the  sepulchres  of  the  sons  of  David,  express- 
ing thereby,  that  they  looked  on  him  as  the  worthiest  and  best 
of  all  that  had  reigned  over  them  of  that  family,  since  him 
that  was  the  first  founder  of  it. 

The  burial-place,  called  the  sepulchres  of  the  kings  of 
the  house  of  David  (which  hath  been  afore  spoken  of)  was 
a  very  sumptuous  and  stately  thing. ^  It  lies  now  within  the 
walls  of  Jerusalem,  but  as  is  supposed,  was  formerly'*  within 

s  2  Kings  xix.  37.     2  Chron.  xxxii.  21.     Iba.  xxxvii.  38. 
t  Bishop  Patrick  on  2  Kings  xix.  37.  Salianus  sub  anno  ante  Cliristum  729. 
u  Africanus  apud  Syncellum,   p.  74.  x  Ptol.  Can. 

y  2  Kings  xx.  21.  2  Cbron.  xxxii.  33. 

2  Thevenot's  Travels,  parti,   book  2,  c.  40.     Maiindrel's  Journey  from 
Aleppo  to  Jerusalem,  p.  76. 
a  Maimonide*  in  bis  trart.  Beth  Habbecbirah-  c.   7,  saith,  in  Jerusalem. 


11€  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

them,  before  that  city  was  destroyed  by  the  Romans.  It  con- 
sists of  a  large  court  of  about  one  hundred  and  twenty  feet 
square,  with  a  gallery,  or  cloister,  on  the  left  hand,  which 
court  and  gallery,  with  the  pillars  that  supported  it,  were  cut 
out  of  the  solid  marble  rock.  At  the  end  of  the  gallery 
there  is  a  narrow  passage  or  hole,  througli  which  there  is  an 
entrance  into  a  large  room  or  hall,  of  about  twenty-four  feet 
square,  within  which  there  are  several  lesser  rooms  one  within 
another,  with  stone  doors  opening  into  them ;  all  which  rooms, 
with  the  great  room,  were  all  likewise  cut  out  of  the  solid 
marble  rock.  In  the  sides  of  those  lesser  rooms  are  several 
niches,  in  which  the  corpses  of  the  deceased  kings  were  de- 
posited in  stone  cotfins.  In  the  innermost,  or  chiefest  of  these 
rooms,  was  the  body  of  Hezekiah  laid  in  a  niche,  perchance 
cut  on  purpose  at  that  lime  for  it  in  the  upper  end  of  that 
room,  to  do  him  the  greater  honour;  and  all  this  remains 
entire  even  to  this  day.  It  seems  to  have  been  the  work  of 
king  Solomon,  for  it  could  not  have  been  made  without  vast 
expense  ;  and  it  is  the  only  true  remainder  of  old  Jerusalem 
which  is  now  to  be  seen  in  that  place. 

Hezekiah,  during  his  reign,  much  improved  the  city  of  Je- 
rusalem, not  only''  by  newly  fortifying  it,  erecting  magazines 
therein,  and  filling  them  with  all  manner  of  armoury,  which 
were  of  use  in  those  days,  but  also  by  building*^  a  new  aque- 
duct, which  was  of  great  convenience  to  the  inhabitants  for 
the  supplying  of  them  with  water:  and,  for  the  '^better  pro- 
moting of  religion,  he  maintained  skilful  scribes  to  collate  to- 
gether and  write  out  copies  of  the  holy  Scripture  ;  and  it  is 
particularly  mentioned,  that  the  Proverbs  of  Solomon  were 
thus  collected  together  and  wrote  out  by  those  men. 

And  in  his  time  the  Simeonites,^  being  straitened  in  their 
habitations,  much  enlarged  their  borders  toward  the  south  : 
for  falling  on  the  Amalekites,  who  dwelt  in  part  of  Mount 
Seir,  and  in  the  rich  valley  adjoining,  they  smote  them,  and 
utterly  destroyed  them,  and  dwelt  in  their  rooms. 

But  it  was  the  misfortune  of  this  good  king  Hezekiah  to 

be  succeeded  by  a  son  who  was   the   wickedest  and  worst  of 

the    whole  race :  for  after    him  reigned  Manasseh,' 

Maii^^.  ^'""^    being  a  minor   only   twelve   years  old,   at  his 

coming  to  the  crown,  had  the  misfortune  to  fall  into 

they  do  not  allow  a  sepulchre,  except  the  sepulchres  of  the  house  of  David, 
and  the  sepulchre  of  Huldah,  the  prophetess,  which  were  there  from  the 
days  of  the  former  prophets.  This  proxies  these  sepulchrts  to  have  been  within 
the  walls  of  Jerusalem,  and  that  the  words  of  Scripture  which  place  them  in  the 
city  of  David  are  slrictli/  to  be  understood. 

b  2  Chron.  xxxii.  5.     Ecclesiasticus  xlvlii.  17. 

c  2Kings  sx.  20.     2  Chron.  xxxii.  30.     Ecclesiasticus  xlviii.  17. 
a  Prov,.xxv.  1.        el  Chron.  iv.  3^—43.        f  2  Kings  xxi.    2  Chron.  xxxiii- 


BOOK  I.j      THE  OtD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  119" 

the  hands  of  such  of  the  nobility  for  his  guardians  and  chief 
ministers,  who,  being  ill  affected  to  his  father's  reformation, 
took  care  to  breed  him  up  in  the  greatest  aversion  to  it  that, 
they  were  able,  corrupting  his  youth  with  the  worst  of  prin- 
ciples, both  as  to  religion  and  government ;  so  that,  when 
he  grew  up,  he  proved  the  most  impious  towards  God,  and 
most  tyrannical  and  wicked  towards  his  subjects,  of  any  that 
had  ever  reigned,  either  in  Jerusalem  or  Samaria,  over  the 
tribes  of  Israel;  for  he  not  only  restored  all  the  idolatry  of 
Ahaz,  but  went  much  beyond  him  in  every  abomination, 
whereby  the  true  worship  of  God  might  be  suppressed,  and 
his  most  holy  name  dishonoured  in  the  land ;  for  whereas 
Ahaz  did  only  shut  up  th?  house  of  God,  he  converted  it 
into  a  house  of  all  manner  of  idolatrous  profanation,  setting 
up  an  image  in  the  sanctuary,  and  erecting  altars  for  Baalim 
and  all  the  host  of  heaven,  in  both  its  courts;  and  he  also 
practised  witchcrafts,  and  enchantments,  and  dealt  with 
familiar  spirits,  and  >nade  his  children  pass  through  the  fire 
to  Molech,  and  filled  Judah  and  Jerusalem  with  his  high 
places,  idols,  groves,  and  altars  erected  to  false  gods,  and 
brought  in  all  manner  of  other  idolatrous  profanations,  where- 
by the  true  religion  might  be  most  corrupted,  and  all  manner 
of  impiety  be  most  promoted  in  the  kingdom  :  and,  to  all 
these  ways  of  abomination,  he  made  Judah  and  Jerusalem  to 
conform,  raising  a  terrible  persecution  against  all  that  would 
not  comply  with  him  herein,  whereby  he  filled  the  whole  land 
with  innocent  blood,  of  which  he  did  shed  very  much  in  the 
carrying  on  of  these  and  his  other  wicked  purposes.  And 
when  God  sent  his  prophets  to  him,  to  tell  him  of  these  his 
iniquities,  and  to  exhort  him  to  depart  from  them,  he  treated 
them  with  contempt  and  outrage,  and  several°  of  them  he 
put  to  death  ;  and,  particularly,  it  is  said,  that  Isaiah  the 
prophet,  on  this  account,  suffered  martyrdom  under  him,  by 
being  cruelly  sawn  asunder.  This  was  an  old  tradition'' 
among  the  Jews  ;  and  the  holy  apostle,  St.  Paul,  in  his  epistle 
to  the  Hebrews  (c.  xi.  37,)  having  among  the  torments  under- 
gone by  the  prophets  and  martyrs  of  foregoing  times,  reckon- 
ed that  of  being  sawn  asunder,'  he  is  generally  thought  in 
that  place  to  have  had  respect  hereto.  By  which  horrid  ini- 
quities and  abominations,  God  was  so  justly  inscensed  against 
the  land,  that  he  declared  hereon,J  that  he  would  stretch  out 

g  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  4. 

h  Talmud.  Hierosol.  io  Sanhedria,  fol.  28,  col.  3.  Talm.  Babylon,  in  Je- 
vammoth,  fol.  49,  col.  2,  et  in  Sanhedrin,  fol.  103,  col.  2.  Shaleshelletb 
Hakkabbalah,  fol.  19,  col.  1.    Yalcut  Lib.  Regum,  fol.  38,  col.  4. 

i  Vide  Justin.  Martyr,  in  Dialogo  cum  Tryphone.  Hieronymum  in  Esai« 
»ni,  c,  20 and  57.    Epiphaniuni,  et  alios.  j  2  Kings  x^si.  13 


ll;>0  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  Oi'  [PAKT  !. 

over  Jerusalem  the  line  of  Samaria,  and  the  plummet  of  the 
house  of  Ahab,  and  wipe  Jerusalem  clean  of  all  its  inhabit- 
ants, as  a  man  wipeth  a  dish,  and  turneth  it  when  empty 
upside  down.  Which,  accordingly,  was  executed  upon  it,  in 
the  destruction  of  that  city,  and  the  desolation  which  was 
brought  upon  all  Judah  at  the  same  time.  And  among  ail 
the  iniquities  that  drew  down  these  heavy  judgments  upon 
that  city  and  land,  the  sins  of  Manasseh  are  always  reckoned 
as  the  most  provoking  cause  ;'  by  which  an  estimate  may  be 
best  made  of  the  greatness  of  them. 

In  the  tifth  year  of  Manasseh  died  Apronadius,"  king  of 
Babylon,  and  was  succeeded  b)  Regibilus,""  who 
M^as-'s.  reigned  only  one  year.  After  him,  Mesessimordacus 
had  the  kingdom,  and  held  it  four  years. 

In  the  eleventh  year  of  Manasseh  died  Tirhakah,"  king 
of  Egypt,  after  he  had  reigned  there  eighteen  years, 
Mana^f^'i.  who  was  the  last  of  the  Ethiopian  kings  that  reigned 
in  that  country.  The  Egyptians,  after  his  death,  not 
being  able  to  agree  about  the  succession,  continued  for"  two 
years  together  in  a  state  of  anarchy  and  great  confusion,  till^ 
at  length,  twelve  of  the  principal  nobility  conspiring  together 
seized  the  kingdom,  and,  dividing  it  among  themselves  into 
twelve  parts,  governed  it  by  Joint  confederacy  fifteen  years. 

The  same  year  that  this  happened  in  Egypt,  by  the  death 
of  Tirhakah,  the  like  happened  in  Babylon,  by  tlie  death  of 
Mesessimordacus.  For,  he  leaving  no  son  behind  him  to  in- 
herit the  kingdom,'^  an  interregnum  of  anarchy  and  confu- 
sion followed  there,  for  eight  years  together  ;  of  which  Esar- 
Viaddon,  king  of  Assyria,  taking  the  advantage,  seized 
Mana^^la  Babylon  ;  and  adding  it  to  his  former  empire,  thence- 
forth reigned  over  both  for  thirteen  years. "^  He  is  in 
the  canon  of  Ptolemy  called  Assar-Adinus.  And  in  the 
Scriptures  he  is  spoken  of  as  king  of  Babylon  and  Assyria 
jointly  together.'  In  Ezra  he  is  called  Asnappar,*  and  hath 
there  the  honourable  epithets  of  the  great  and  noble,  added 
to  his  name  by  the  author  of  that  book;  which  argues  him 
to  have  been  a  prince  of  great  excellency  and  worth  in  hii 

1  2  Kings  xxiii.  26  ;  and  xxiv.  3.     Jer.  xv.  4.       m  Canon  Ptolemaei. 

n  Africanus  apud  Syncellum,  p.  74.  o  Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  1- 

p  Herodotus,  lib.  2.     niodorus  Siculus,  lib.  1. 

q  Canon  Ptolemaei.  r  Canon  Ptolemaji. 

s  He  is  said,  as  king  of  Assyria,  to  have  brought  a  colony  out  of  Babylon 
into  Samaria,  2  Kings  xvii.  24,  Ezra  iv.  9,  10,  which  he  could  not  have 
done,  if  he  had  not  been  kingof  Baliylon,  as  well  as  of  \ssyria,  at  that  time. 
And  in  2  Chron.  xxiii.  11,  he  is  said,  as  king  of  Assyria,  to  have  taken  Ma- 
nasseh prisoner,  and  to  have  carried  him  to  Babylon,  which  argues  him,  at 
that  time,  to  have  been  king  of  Babylon  also. 

t  Ezra  iv.  10 


BOOK    I.]  THE  OLD  AND  ^'EW  TESTAMENTS.  121 

time,  and  far  exceeding  all  others,  that  had  reigned  before 
him  in  either  of  the  kingdoms. 

In  the  twenty-second  year  of  Manasseh,  Esarhaddon,  after 
he  had  now  entered  on  the  fourth  year  of  his  reign  in  Baby- 
Ion,  and  fully  settled  his  authority  there,  began  to  set  his 
thoughts  on  the  recovery  of  what  had  been  lost  to 
the  empire  of  the  Assyrians,  in  Syria  and  Palestine, ivian"j^^;' 
on  the  destruction  of  his  father's  army  in  Judea, 
and  on  that  doleful  retreat,  which  thereon  he  was  forced  to 
make  from  thence  ;  and,  being  encouraged  to  this  under- 
taking by  the  great  augmentation  of  strength  which  he  had 
acquired,  by  adding  Babylon  and  Chaldea  to  his  former  king- 
dom of  Assyria,  he  prepared  a  great  army,  and  marched  into 
those  parts,  and  again  added  them  to  the  Assyrian  empire^ 
And  then  was  accomplished  the  prophecy  which  was  spo- 
ken by  Isaiah,  in  the  first  year  of  Ahaz,  against  Samaria," 
that,  within  threescore  and  five  years,  Ephraim  should  be 
absolutely  broken,  so  as  from  thenceforth  to  be  no  more  a 
people.  For  this  year,  being  exactly  sixty-five  years  from 
the  first  of  Ahaz,  Esarhaddon,  after  he  had  settled  all  affairs 
in  Syria,  marched  into  the  land  of  Israel,  and  there  taking 
captive  all  those  who  were  the  remains  of  the  former  cap- 
tivity (excepting  only  some  few  who  escaped  his  hands,  and 
continued  still  in  the  land,)  carried  them  away  into  Babylon 
and  Assyria  ;  and  then,  to  prevent  the  land  from  becoming 
desolate,  he  brought  others  from  Babylon,^  and  from  Cuthah, 
and  from  Ava,  and  Hamath,  and  Sepharvaim,  to  dwell  in  the 
cities  of  Samaria  in  their  stead.  And  so  the  ten  tribes  of 
Israel,  which  had  separated  from  the  house  of  David,  were 
brought  to  a  full  and  utter  destruction,  and  never  after  recover- 
ed themselves  again.  For  those  who  were  thus  carried  away, 
as  well  in  this  as  in  the  former  captivities  (excepting  only 
some  few,  who  joining  themselves  to  the  Jews  in  the  land  of 
their  captivity,  returned  with  them,)  soon  going  into  the 
usages  and  idolatry  of  the  nations  among  whom  they  were 
planted,  to  which  they  were  too  much  addicted  while  in 
their  own  land,  after  a  while  became  wholly  absorbed 
and  swallowed  up  in  them ;  and  thenceforth,  utterly  losing 
their  name,  their  language,  and  their  memorial,  were  never 
after  any  more  spoken  of.  And  whereas  there  is  a  sect 
of  Samaritans  still  remaining  in  Samaria,  Sichcm,  and  other 
towns  thereabout,  even  to  this  day,  who  still  have  the  law 
of  Moses  in  a  character  peculiar  to  themselves,  and  in  a  dia- 
lect very  little,  if  any  thing  at  all,  different  from  that  of  the 
Jews  ;  yet  these  are  not  of  the  descendants  of  the  Israelites, 

u  Isa.  vii.  8  x  2  Kings  xvu.24.  Ezraiv.  2,  10, 

Vol.  L  16  ' 


122  CONNEXION    OF    THE    HISTORY   OP  [pART  I* 

but  of  those  nations  which  Esarhaddon  brought  to  dwell  in 
that  country  in  their  stead,  after  the  others  had  been  carried 
thence  into  captivity;  and,  for  this  reason,  the  Jews  call 
them  by  no  other  name  than  that  of  Cuthites  (the  name  of 
one  of  those  nations  whom  Esarhaddon  had  planted  there,) 
and  have  that  utter  hatred  and  aversion  to  them,  that  reck- 
oning them  among  the  worst  of  heretics,  they  express 
on  all  occasions  a  greater  detestation  of  them  than  they  do 
even  of  the  Christians  themselves. 

Esarhaddon,  after  he  had  thus  possessed  himself  of  the  land 
of  Israel,  sent  some  of  his  princes,  with  part  of  his  army, 
into  Judea,  to  reduce  that  country  also  under  his  subjection; 
who  having  vanquished  Manasseh  in  battle,  >'  and  taken  him, 
hid  in  a  thicket  of  thorns,  brought  him  prisoner  to  Esarhad- 
don, who  bound  him  in  fetters,  and  carried  him  to  Babylon  ; 
where,  his  chains  and  his  prison  having  brought  him  to  him- 
self, and  a  due  sense  of  his  great  sin,  wherewith  he  had  sin- 
ned against  the  Lord  his  God,  he  returned  unto  him  with  re- 
pentance and  prayer,  and  in  his  affliction,  greatly  humbled 
himself  before  him  ;  whereon,  God  being  entreated  of  by 
him,  he  mollitied  the  heart  of  the  king  of  Babylon  towards 
him,  so  that,  on  a  treaty,  he  was  again  restored  to  his  liberty, 
and  returned  to  Jerusalem  ;  and  then,  knowing  the  Lord  to 
be  God,  he  abolished  all  those  idolatrous  profanations,  both 
out  of  the  temple,  and  out  of  all  other  parts  of  the  land, 
which  he  had  in  his  wickedness  introduced  into  them,  and 
again  restored  in  all  things  the  reformation  of  king  Hezekiah, 
his  father,  and  walked  according  thereto  all  the  remainder  of 
his  life,  worshipping  the  Lord  his  God  only,  and  none  other. 
And  all  Judah  conformed  to  him  herein  ;  so  that  he  continued 
in  prosperity  after  this  to  the  end  of  his  reign,  which  was  the 
longest  of  any  of  the  kings  that  had  sat  on  the  throne  of 
David,  either  before  or  after  him  :  for  he  reigned  full  fifty- 
five  years,  and  these  being  all  reckoned  to  his  reign  without 
any  chasm,  it  is  argued  from  hence,  that  his  captivity  at  Ba- 
bylon could  not  have  been  long  ;  but  that  he  was  within  a 
very  short  time  after  again  released  from  it. 

And  to  this  time  may  be  referred  the  completion  of  the 
prophecy  of  Isaiah  concerning  the  removal  of  Shebna,^  the 
chief  minister  of  state,  and  the  advancement  of  Eliakim,  the 
son  of  Hilkiah  in  his  place.  Both  of  them  had  been  minis- 
ters of  state  under  king  Hezekiah,  Shebna  having  been  his 
scribe  or  secretary,  and  Eliakim  the  master  of  his  household. 
And  their  history,  as  far  as  may  be  collected  from  the  words 
of  the  prophet,  appears  to  be  thus.     Shebna,  being  a  very 

y2  Chron.  xxXui.  11.  Joseph  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  4.      z  Isa.  xsii.  15r-25 


IJOOKI.]  THE  OLD  AiNTD  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  123 

wicked  man,  was  a  fit  person  to  serve  the  lusts  and  evil  incli- 
nations of  Manasseh  in  the  first  part  of  his  reign,  and  there- 
fore was  made  his  first  minister  of  state  ;  and  Eliakim,  who 
was  of  a  quite  contrary  character,  was  quite  laid  aside.  But 
on  the  revolution  that  happened  on  the  coming  of  the  army 
of  the  Assyrians,  Shebna*  was  taken  prisoner  with  his  master, 
and  carried  to  Babylon,  and  there  detained  in  captivity''  to 
his  death.  And  therefore  Manasseh,  on  his  repentance  and 
return  to  Jerusalem,  having  resolved  on  other  measures,  call- 
ed for  Eliakim,  and  put  the  management  of  all  his  affairs 
into  his  hands;  who,  being  a  person  of  great  wisdom,  justice, 
and  piety,  soon  re-established  them  upon  the  same  footing 
as  they  had  been  in  the  days  of  Hezekiah,  and  so  preserved 
them  in  peace  and  prosperity  all  his  time,  to  the  great  honour 
of  the  king,  and  the  good  of  all  his  people ;  and  therefore 
he  hath  the  character  given  him,  of  being  a  father*^  to  the 
inhabitants  of  Jerusalem,  and  to  all  the  house  of  Judah,  and 
that,  having  the  key  and  government  of  the  house  of  David'^ 
upon  his  shoulders,  he  was  the  great  support  of  it  all  his 
days.  This  Eliakim  is  supposed  to  have  been  of  the  ponti- 
fical family,  and  to  have  himself,  in  the  time  of  Manasseh, 
borne  the  office  of  high-priest,  and  to  have  been  the  same  who 
is  mentioned  by  the  name  of  Joiakim,  or  Eliakim,  in  the  his- 
tory of  Judith,  as  high-priest  at  that  time  ;  for  Joiakim  and 
Eliakim  are  both  the  same  name,  being  both  of  the  same 
signification  in  the  Hebrew  tongue,  and  therefore  the  said 
high-priest  in  Judith  is,  in  the  Syriac  version,  and  also  in  Je- 
rome's Latin  version  of  that  book,  called  promiscuously  by 
both  these  names.  But  of  this  more  will  be  said  hereafter 
in  its  proper  place. 

The  nations  which  Esarhaddon  had  brought  to  dwell  in 
the  cities  of  Samaria,  instead  of  the  Israelites  who 
had  been  carried  thence,  being,  on  their  settling  in  Manas^s 
that  country,®  much  infested  with  lions,  and  the  king 
of  Babylon  being  told,  that  it  was  because  they  worshipped 
not  the  God  of  the  country,  he  ordered,  that  one  of  the  priests, 
which  had  been  carried  thence,  should  be  sent  back  to  teach 
these  new  inhabitants  how  to  worship  the  God  of  Israel. 
But  they  only  took  him  hereon  into  the  number  of  their  for- 
mer deities,  and  worshipped  him  jointly  with  the  gods  of  the 
nations  from  whence  they  came ;  and  in  this  corruption  of 
joining  the  worship  of  their  false  gods  with  that  of  the  true, 
they  continued  till  the  building  of  the  Samaritan  temple  on 
mount  Gerizim  by  Sanballat ;    but,  on  that  occasion,  abun- 

a  Isa.  xxii.  17.  h  Isa.  xxii.  18. 

,  c  Isa.  xxii.  21.  d  Isa,  xxii.  22, 

e  3  Kings  xvii. 


124  CONNEXION  OJP    THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  U 

dance  of  Jews  falling  off  to  them,  they  reduced  them  from 
this  idolatry  to  the  worship  of  the  true  God  only,  as  shall  be 
hereafter  related  ;  and  they  have  continued  in  the  same  wor- 
ship ever  since,  even  to  this  day. 

In  the  eight  and  twentieth  year  of  the  reign  of  Manassch, 

the  twelve  confederated  sovereigns  of  Egypt,  after 
Manal'is.  they  had  jointly  reigned   there  til'teen    years,  iallins; 

^  out  among  themselves,  expelled  Psammitichus,  one 
of  their  number,  out  of  his  share,  which  he  had  hitherto  had 
with  them  in  the  government  of  the  kingdom,  and  drove  him 
into  banishment ;  wheicon,  flying  into  the  fens  near  the  sea, 
he  lay  hid  there,  till,  having  gotten  together  out  of  the  Ara- 
bian freebooters,  and  the  pirates  of  Caria  and  Ionia,  such  a 
number  of  soldiers,  as,  with  the  Egyptians  of  his  party,  made 
a  considerable  army,  he  marched  with  it  against  the  other 
eleven,  and,  having  overthrown  them  in  battle,  slew  several 
of  them,  and  drove  the  rest  out  of  the  land  ;  and  thereon, 
seizing  the  whole  kingdom,  to  himself,  reigned  over  it  in 
great  prosperity  fifty  and  four  years. 

As  soon  as  he  was  well  settled  in  the  kingdom,  he  ^entered 

into  a  war  with  the  king  of  Assyria,  about  the  boun- 
Manas!^29.  darics  of  their  two  empires,  which  lasted  many  years  : 

for,  after  the  Assyrians  had  conquered  Syria,  Pales- 
tine only  separating  their  respective  territories,  it  became  a 
constant  bone  of  contention  between  them,  as  it  was  between 
the  Ptolemies  and  the  Selucidae  afterward,  both  parlies  stri- 
ving which  of  the  two  should  have  the  mastery  of  this  pro- 
vince ;  and  according  as  they  prevailed,  sometimes  the  one, 
and  sometimes  the  other,  possessed  themselves  of  it.  From 
the  time  of  Hezekiah,  it  appears  to  have  been  in  the  hands 
of  the  Egyptians  till  the  captivity  of  Manassch.  But,  when 
Esarhaddon  had  conquered  Judea,  and  carried  the  king  pri- 
soner to  Babylon,  (as  hath  been  above  mentioned,)  it  is  plain, 
that,  from  thenceforth  the  king  of  Assyria  became  master  of 
all,  even  to  the  very  entry  of  Egypt;  and  the  Egyptians, 
being  at  that  time  divided  under  several  princes,  and  in  civil 
wars  among  themselves,  were  in  no  capacity  to  put  a  stop  to 
this  progress.  But  when  i'sammitichus  had  gained  the  whole 
monarchy  to  himself,  and  again  settled  the  atiairs  of  that  king- 
dom upon  its  former  foundation  (which  happened  about  seven 
years  after  the  captivity  of  Manasseh,)  he  thought  it  time  to 
look  to  the  frontiers  of  his  kingdom,  and  secure  them  as  well 
as  he  could  against  the  power  of  this  growing  neighbour,  and 
therefore  marched  with  an  army  into  Palestine  for  this  pur-' 
^ose  ;  but,  in  the  entry  thereof,  he  found  Ashdod,  one  of  the 

i  Heroflot.  lib.  5.     Rioclom?  Siculo?,  lib.  1.        g  Herodotus,  lib.  2 


gOOK  I.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEV;  TESTAMENTS.  125 

first  towns  of  that  country,  so  strong  a  barrier  against  hin:i, 
that  it  cost  him  a  blockade  of  nine  and  twenty  years, ^  before 
he  could  make  himself  master  of  it. 

This  place  had  former!}  bten '  one  of  the  five  capital 
cities  of  the  country  of  the  Philistines.  After  this,  the 
Egyptians  got  possession  of  it,  and,  by  well  fortifying  it, 
made  it  so  strong  a  barrier  of  their  empire  on  that  side,  that 
Sennacherib  could  not  enU.-r  Egypt,  till  he  had,  by  Tartan,**^ 
one  of  his  generals,  made  himself  master  of  it;  and  when  he 
had  gotten  it  into  his  possession,  finding  the  importance  of 
the  place,  he  added  so  much  to  its  strength,  that,  notwith- 
standing his  unfortunate  retreat  out  of  Egypt,  and  the  terri- 
ble loss  oi  his  army  in  Judea  immediately  after,  the  Assy- 
rians still  kept  it  even  to  this  time  ;  and  it  was  not  without 
that  long  and  tedious  siege,  which  1  have  mentioned,  that  the 
Egyptians  at  last  became  again  masters  of  it.  And,  when 
they  had  gotten  it,  they  found  it  in  such  a  manner  wasted  and 
reduced  by  so  long  a  war,  that  it  did  them  but  little  servce 
afterward  :  it  being  then  no  more  than  the  carcase  of  that 
city  which  it  had  formerly  been.  And  therefore  the  pro- 
phet Jeremiah  speaking  of  it,  calls  it  "  the  remnant  of  Ash- 
dod,"'  intimating  thereby  that  it  was  then  only  the  poor  re- 
mains of  what  it  had  been  in  times  foregoing. 

But  notwithstanding  this  long  siege,  the  whole  war  did  not 
rest  there.  While  part  of  the  army  lay  at  the  blockade,  the 
rest  carried  en  the  war  against  the  other  parts  of  Palestine  • 
and  so  it  continued  ma.iy  years,  which  obliged  Manasseh""  to 
fortify  Jerusalem  anew,  and  to  put  strong  garrisons  into  all  his 
frontier  towns  against  them;  for,  since  his  release  from  the 
captivity  of  the  Assyrians,  and  the  restoration  of  his  kingdom 
again  to  him,  he  was  obliged  to  become  their  homager,  and 
engage  on  their  side  in  this  war  against  the  Egyptians,  al- 
though they  had  been  his  (brmer  allies.  And  the  better  to 
enable  him  to  support  himself  herein,  and  also  the  more 
firmly  to  (ix  him  in  his  fidelity  to  them,  they  seem  at  this 
time  to  have  put  under  his  command  all  the  other  parts  of  the 
land  of  Canaan,  that  is,  all  that  had  been  formerly  possessed 
by  the  kings  of  Samaria,  as  well  as  what  belonged  to  him  as 
king  of  Judah  ;  for  it  is  certain,  that  Josiah,  his  grandson, 
had  all  this  (as  will  be  hereafter  shown,)  that  is,  not  only  the 
two  tril)es  which  made  up  the  kingdom  of  Judah,  but  also 
all  that  had  formerly  been  possessed  by  the  other  ten  under 
the  kings  of  Israel.  And  the  most  probable  account  that 
can  be  given  of  his  coming  by  all  this  is,  that  it  was  all  given 

g  Herodotus,  lib.  2.  i  1  Sara.  vi.  17. 

t  tsa.  ss.  1.  I  Jer,  sxv.  20.  m  2  Chron.  xxsiii.  14. 


126  CONNEXION    OF    THE    HISTORY    OP  [PART    1. 

to  Manasseli,  on  this  occasion,  to  hold  in  homage  of  the  kings 
of  Assyria,  and  that,  after  his  death,  it  was  continued  to  his 
son  and  grand-^on  on  the  same  conditions  ;  in  the  perform- 
ance of  r'.hich  that  good  and  Just  prince,  king  Josiah,  after- 
ward lost  his  life,  as  will  be  shown  in  its  proper  place. 
In  the  thirtj-tirst  year  of  Manasseh  died  Esarhaddon 
after  he  had  reigned,  with  great  felicit},  thirty-nine 
jUiTasfa?.'  years  over  the  Assyrians,  and  thirteen  over  the  Babylo- 
nians ;  and  Saosduchinus,  °  his  son,  reigned  in  his  stead. 
He  is  the  same  wlio  in  the  book  of  Judith  is  called"  Nabu- 
chodonosor.  In  the  beginning  of  the  twelfth  year  of  his 
reign,  which  was  the  forty-third  of  Manasseh,  p  he 
Manasf°43.  fought  a  great  battle  in  the  plains  of  Ragau,  with 
Deioces,  king  of  .Media,  (who  in  the  book  of  Judith 
is  called  i  Arphaxad,)  and,  having  overthrown  him,  and  put 
him  to  flight,  pursued  after  him  to  the  adjacent  moun- 
tains, where  he  made  his  retreat,  and  there  having  over- 
taken him,  he  cut  him  otf,  and  all  his  army  ;  and  thereon 
following  his  blow,  and  making  the  best  of  the  advantage 
he  had  gotten,  he  made  himself  master  of  many  of  the 
cities  of  Media,  and  among  them  took  Ecbatana  "■  itself,  the 
royal  seat  of  the  Median  empire  ;  and,  after  having  miserably 
defaced  it,  returned  in  great  triumph  to  Nineveh,  and  there 
took  his  pleasure  in  banqueting  and  feasting,  both  he  and  his 
army,  for  an  hundred  and  twenty  days. 

After  this  time  of  feasting  was  over,  he  called  his  officers,"* 
nobles,  and  chief  counsellors  together,  to  take  an  account  of 
what  tributary  countries  and  provinces  had  not  gone  with  him 
to  the  war,  for  he  had  summoned  them  all  to  attend  him 
herein  ;  and,  finding  that  none  of  the  western  countries  had 
paid  any  regard  to  his  commands  in  this  matter,  he  made  a 
decree,  that  Holofernes,  the  chief  captain  of  his  army,  should 
go  forth  to  execute  the  wrath  of  his  lord  upon  them  for  it. 
And,  accordingly,  the  next  year  after,  he  marched 
Manas.^t  westward  with  an  army  of  an  hundred  and  twenty 
thousand  foot,  and  twelve  thousand  horse,  and  there 
wasted  and  destroyed  a  great  many  of  those  nations ;  till  at 
length  coming  into  Judea,  and  laying  siege  to  Bethulia,  he 
was  there  destroyed,  and  all  his  army  cut  in  pieces,  in  the 
manner  as  is  in  the  book  of  Judith  at  full  related. 

That  Arphaxad  in  the  said  book  of  Judith  was  Deioces, 
and  Nabuchodonosor,  Saosduchinus, appear  sfrom  hence,  that 
Arphaxad  is   said  to  be  that  king  of  Media,    who  was  the  ' 


n  Canon  Ptol.  o  Judith  i.  1.  p  Judith  i.  6. 

q  Judith  i.  1.  r  Judith  i.  H.  s  Judith  ii.  *> 

t  Judith  i.1,2. 


^fOOK  I.j  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  127 

founder  of  Ecbatana,  which  all  other  writers  agree  to  have 
been  Deioces  ;  and  the  beginning  of  the  twelfth  year  of  Sa- 
osduchinus  exactly  agreeth  with  the  last  year  of  Deioces, 
when  this  battle  of  Ragau  is  said  to  have  been  fought.  And 
there  are  several  particulars  in  that  history,  which  make  it 
utterly  inconsistent  with  any  other  times;  for  it  was  while 
Nineveh  was  the  metropolis  of  the  Assyrian  empire, "  it  was 
while  the  Persians,  Syrians,  Phoenicians,  Cilicians,  and  Egyp- 
tians,* were  subject  to  them  ;  it  was  while  the  Median^  em- 
pire was  in  being,  and  not  long  after  the  building  of  Ecbata- 
na; none  of  which  could  be  after  the  captivity  of  Judah, 
where  some  would  place  this  history.  For,  before  that  time, 
Nineveh  had  been  long  destroyed,  and  both  the  Assyrian  and 
Median  empires  had  been  wholly  extinguished,  and  the  Per- 
sians, instead  of  being  subject  to  the  Assyrians,  had  made 
themselves  lords  over  them,  and  over  all  the  other  nations 
of  the  East,  fiom  the  Hellespont  to  the  river  Indus;  for  so 
far  they  had  extended  and  established  their  empire,  before 
the  Jews  were  returned  from  the  Babylonish  captivity,  and 
settled  again  in  their  own  country.  And  therefore  we  must 
go  much  higher  than  the  times  after  that  captivity,  to  find  a 
proper  scene  for  the  matters  in  that  book  related  ;  and  it  can 
be  nowhere  laid  more  agreeably  both  with  Scripture  and  pro- 
fane history,  than  in  the  time  where  1  have  placed  it. 

This  book  of  Judith  was  originally  written^  in  the  Chal- 
dee  language,  by  some  Jew  of  Babylon,  (which  is  not  now 
extant,)  and  from  thence,  at  the  desire  of  Paula  and  Eusto- 
chium,  was,  by  St.  Jerome,  translated  fnto  the  Latin  tongue  ; 
which  is  the  translation  that  is  now  extant  in  the  vulgar 
Latin  edition  of  the  Bible,  of  which  he  himself  saith,  in  the 
preface  before  it,  that  he  did  not  translate  it  word  for  word, 
but  only  rendered  it  according  to  the  sense  of  the  author ; 
and  that,  cutting  off  all  the  corruptions  of  various  readings, 
which  he  found  in  different  copies,  he  did  putonly  that  into  the 
the  translation,  which  he  Judged  to  be  the  trueand  entiresense 
of  the  original.  But,  besides  this  translation  of  St.  Jerome, 
there  are  two  others,  one  in  Greek,  and  the  other  in  Syriac. 
That  which  is  in  Greek  is  attributed  to  Theodotion,  who  flou- 
rished in  the  time  of  Commodus,  who  was  made  Roman  empe- 
ror in  the  year  of  Christ  1 80.  But  it  must  be  much  ancienter ; 
for  Clemens  Romanus,  in  his  epistle  to  the  Corinthians  (which 
was  wrote  near  one  hundred  and  twenty  years  before,)  brings 
a  quotation  out  of  it.  The  Syriac  translation  was  made  from 
the  Greek,  and   so  was  also   the  English,  which  we  at  pre- 

u  Judith  i.  1 .  X  Judith  i.  7—10. 

y  Judith  i.  1,  2. 

A  Hieronymi  Praefatto  in  Librurn  Judith 


128  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [I'ART  If, 

sent  have  among  the  apocryphal  writings  in  our  Bible.  And 
it  is  to  be  observed,  that  all  these  three  versions,  last  men- 
tioned, have  several  particulars,  which  are  not  in  Jerome's; 
and  some  of  these  seem  to  be  tho:;e  various  readings,  which 
he  profcsseth  to  have  cut  off"  as  corruptions  of  the  text ;  and 
particularly  that  which  is  added  in  the  thirteenth  verse  of  the 
first  chapter,  appears  to  be  of  this  sort;  for  there  the  battle 
of  Ragau  is  placed  in  the  seventeenth  year  of  Nabucho- 
donosor,  which  is  directly  contradictory  to  what  is  in  the 
former  part  of  the  same  chapter,  for  there  it  is  positively  said 
that  it  was  in  the  twelfth  year  of  his  reign.  And,  agreeable 
hereto,  Jerome's  version  placeth  the  expedition  of  Holo- 
fernes  (that  was  the  next  year  after)  in  the  thirteenth  year  of 
Nabuchodonosor,  which  is  the  truth  of  the  matter;  whereas 
the  other,  following  the  blunder  of  the  former  contra- 
diction, makes  another,  by  placing  it  in  the  eighteenth  year 
of  his  reign,  and  so  renders  that  part  of  the  history  wholly 
inconsistent  with  itself.  And  therefore  certainly,  in  this 
particular,  Jerome's  version  is  to  be  preferred,  which  gives 
good  reason  to  think,  that  it  ought  to  be  so  in  all  the  rest, 
wherever  there  is  any  dilFerence  between  them. 

But  still,  whether  the  book  be  a  true  or  a  feigned  history, 
is  what  learned  men  are  not  agreed  in.  The  Romanists  will 
have  it  all  to  be  true ;  for  they  have  received  it  into  the 
canon  of  divine  writ.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  the  opi- 
nion of  Grotius,'*  that  it  is  wholly  a  parabolical  fiction,  writ- 
ten in  the  time  of  Antiochus  Epiphanes,  when  he  came  into 
Judea  to  raise  a  persecution  against  the  Jewish  church  ;  and 
that  the  design  of  it  was,  to  confirm  the  Jews  under  that  per- 
secution in  their  hopes  that  God  would  send  them  a  deliver- 
ance:  'That  therein,  by  Judith  is  meant  Judea:  by  Be- 
thulia,  the  temple  or  house  of  God  ;  and  by  the  sword,  which 
went  out  from  thence,  the  prayers  of  the  saints ;  that  Na- 
buchodonosor doth  there  denote  the  devil  ;  and  the  kingdom 
of  Assyria,  the  devil's  kingdom,  pride:  that  by  Holofernes 
is  there  meant  the  instrument  or  agent  of  the  devil  in  that 
persecution  ;  Antiochus  Epiphanes,  who  made  himself  mas- 
ter of  Judea,  that  fair  widow,  so  called,  because  destitute  of 
relief:  that  Eliakim  signifies  God,  who  would  arise  in  her 
defence,  and  at  length  cut  off  that  instrument  of  the  devil 
who  would  have  corrupted  her.'  This  particular  explica- 
tion of  the  parable  (as  he  will  have  it  to  be)  is,  1  confess,  the 
peculiar  fancy  of  this  great  man  :  but  otherwise  there  are 
abundance  of  other  learned  writers  among  the  Protestants, 
who  agree  with  him  in  the  general,  that  this  book  is  rather 

n  In  Prsefatione  ad  Annotation's  in  Librum  Judifb- 


BOOK  I.]  THE  OLD  Ax\D  r,£\V  TESTAME^JTS'.  129 

a  parabolical  than  a  real  liistory,  made  for  the  instructing 
and  connforting  ot'  the  people  of  the  Jews  under  that  figure, 
and  not  to  give  them  a  narrative  of  any  thing  really  done.; 
and  their  reason  for  it  is,  that  they  think  it  utterly  inconsist- 
ent with  all  times,  where  it  liath  been  endeavoured  to  be 
placed,  either  before  or  after  the  captivity  of  the  Jews.  My 
putting  it  in  the  time  of  Manasseh  takes  oif  allthe  objections 
which  are  brought  to  prove  its  inconsistency  with  the  times 
after  the  captivity,  which,  I  confess,  are  unanswerable. 

But  where  it  here  stands,  the  objections  from  the  other 
part  still  remain  ;  and  they  are  these  following:  1st,  Joakim 
or  Eliakim,  (for  they  are  acknowledged  to  be  both  the 
same  name^)  is  said  in  the  history  of  Judith  to  have  been  then 
high-priest;  but  there  is  none  of  that  name  to  be  found, 
either  in  the  Scriptures  or  in  Josephus,  that  was  high-priest 
before  the  captivity.  2dly,  Achior  the  Ammonite,  in  his 
speech  to  Holofernes,  (ch.  v.  ver.  18,)  there  speaks  of  the 
temple  as  having  been  lately  cast  to  the  ground,  which  was 
not  done  till  the  last  year  of  the  reign  of  Zedekiah ;  and 
therefore  this  cannot  be  consistent  w  ith  any  time  before  it : 
and  the  third  verse  of  chapter  iv.  plainly  puts  it  after  the 
captivity;  for  there  the  text  is,  that  the  people  of  the  Jews 
were  newly  returned  from  their  captivity,  when  Holofernes 
invaded  Judea.  3dly,  The  chief  management  of  the  public 
affairs  of  the  state  are,  in  that  book,  placed  wholly  in  the 
high-priest,  without  any  mention  made  of  the  king  through- 
out the  whole  of  it,  or  implying  in  the  least,  that  there  was 
then  any  such  government  in  tiie  ^iand  ;  which  renders  it 
wholly  inconsistent  with  any  other  times  than  those  in  w-hich 
there  was  no  king  in  Judah.  4thly,  That  in  the  conclusion 
of  the  book,  Judith  is  said  to  have  lived  an  hundred  and  five 
years ;  and  that  none  m.ade  the  children  of  Israel  any  more 
afraid  in  all  her  days,  nor  along  time  after  her  death.  But 
supposing  her  to  have  been  forty-five  years  old  when  she 
went  out  to  Holofernes  (and  in  an  older  age  she  cannot  well 
be  supposed  to  have  beauty  enough  to  charm  such  a  man,) 
to  make  her  an  hundred  and  iive  years  old,  there  must  be 
sixty  years  more  added  to  her  life,  which  will  carry  down 
her  death  to  the  fourth  year  of  Zedekiah,  when  t!ie  state  of 
the  Jews  had  for  several  years  been  exceedingly  disturbed 
by  the  Babylonians,  and  was,  within  a  little  while  after,  to- 
tally subverted  by  them  ;  which  makes  both  her  life  and  her 

b  For  they  are  both  of  the  same  signification,  El  l)eiiig  Uie  name  of  God, 
in  one,   as  Jehovah  is  in  the  other,    and  the  latter  part  of  the   name  is  the 
same  in  both  ;  and  therefore  as  .Tehoiakim,  or  .loakim,  king  of  Judah,  is  call 
ed^also  l^liakim,  so  this  high-priest  is,  in  the  version  of  Jerome,  called  pro 
miscuoiisly  by  both  r.ames. 


13©  tttNNEXlO.N  Oi'  THE  HISTORJf  OF  [pART  I. 

death  absolutely  inconsistent  with  the  times  in  which  thev 
arc  above  placed. 

To  the  first  of  these  objections  it  may  be  answered,  1st, 
That  thoug;h  there  be  no  such  person  as  Joakim,  or  Eliakim, 
named  in  Scripture  to  have  been  high-priest  before  the  cap- 
tivity, yet  this  is  no  argument  but  that  there  might  have  been 
such  an  one;  for  the  Scripture  nowhere  professeth  to  give 
us  an  exact  catalogue  of  all  such  as  had  been  high-priests  till 
the  captivity.  That  which  looks  most  like  it  is  what  we 
have  ill  the  sixth  chapter  of  the  first  book  of  Chronicles. 
But  that  is  only  a  direct  lineal  descent  of  the  pontifical  family 
from  Aaron  to  Jozadak,  the  son  of  Seraiah,  who  was  high- 
priest  at  the  captivity,  and  not  a  catalogue  of  such  as  had 
borne  the  pontifical  office ;  for  several  are  in  that  pedigree 
who  never  were  high-priests,  and  several  are  left  out  that 
were.  The  high-priests  of  the  family  of  Eli  are  instances 
of  the  latter:  for  they  are  left  out  of  that  pedigree,  though 
they  were  high-priests ;  and  those  of  the  true  race,  who 
were  excluded  by  them,  are  instances  of  the  former ;  for 
they  are  in  it,  though  they  never  were  high-priests.  And  it 
is  very  likely,  that,  from  the  time  of  Solomon  to  the  capti- 
vity, many  more  such  instances  might  have  happened  to  hin- 
der that  pedigree  from  being  an  exact  catalogue  of  the  high- 
priests:  for,  on  the  minority,  or  some  other  unqualifying  de- 
fect of  the  right  heir,  the  next  collateral  must  have  been  ad- 
mitted to  the  office,  whose  name  could  not  come  into  the 
pedigree  ;  and.  on  the  failing  of  an  elder  branch  (as  might 
have  happened)  the  heir  of  the  next  collateral  branch  must 
have  come  into  the  office  ;  and  then  the  ancestors  of  the  col- 
lateral successor  must  be  in  the  pedigree,  though  they  never 
had  been  in  the  office,  and  those  of  the  elder  branch,  though 
they  had  been  in  the  office,  could  not  be  in  the  pedigree,  be- 
cause it  had  failed.  For  it  is  only  the  pedigree  of  Jozadak, 
the  son  of  Seraiah,  who  was  high-priest  at  the  captivity, 
which  is  in  a  direct  line  from  Aaron,  that  is  given  us  in  the 
sixth  chapter  of  the  first  book  of  Chronicles :  and  it  being 
the  usage  of  the  Jews  in  their  pedigrees  to  pass  from  a  re- 
mote ancestor  to  a  remote  descendant,  by  leaving  out  those 
who  are  between,  of  which  abundance  of  instances  might  be 
given  in  Scripture,  it  is  possible  this  also  might  have  hap- 
pened in  this  case.  And  thus  much  is  certain,  that  four 
high-priests  named  in  Scripture  are  not  in  that  pedigree, 
/'.  c.  Jehoiadah,and  Zechariahhis  son,  who  were  high-priests 
in  the  reign  of  Joash ;  Azariah,  who  was  high-priest  in  the 
reign  of  Uzziah ;  and  Urijah,  who  was  high-priest  in  the 
reign  of  Ahaz,  kings  of  Judah.  There  are  indeed  two  Aza- 
riahs  named  in  that  pedigree,  besides  t!ie  Azariah  who  wa? 


BOOK  I.J  XHE  OLD  AM)  ivEW  TESTAMENTS.  3  31 

the  father  ofSeraiah;  but  neither  of  these  two  could  be  the  Aza- 
riah  that  was  high-priest  in  the  time  of  Uzziah  :  for  '^Ama- 
riah,  the  son  of  the  last  of  thesaid  two  Azariahs  in  that  pedigree, 
was  high-priest  in  the  time  of  Jehoshaphat,  five  generations 
before.  As  to  the  pedigrees  of  the  high-priests  in  Ezra  and 
Nehemiah,  they  are  but  imperfect  parts  of  that  which  wo 
have  in  the  sixth  chapter  of  the  first  book  of  Chronicles.  As 
for  the  catalogue  of  Josephus,  it  is  so  corrupted,  that  scarce  five 
of  the  names  in  it  agree  with  any  thing  that  we  have  in  Scrip- 
ture. And,  therefore,  putting  all  this  together,  Joakim  or 
Eliakim,  might  have  been  high-priest  in  the  time  of  Manasseh, 
though  there  be  no  mention  of  him  as  such,  by  either  of  his 
names,  either  in  the  holy  Scriptures,  or  in  the  history  of  Jo- 
sephus. But,  2dly,  That  this  Joakim  or  Eliakim  (for  both, 
as  has  been  afore  observed,  is  the  same  name)  is  not  named  in 
Scripture,  is  not  certainly  true  :  for  there  are  some  who  will 
have  Eliakim,  the  son  of  Hilkiah,  that  is  afore  spoken  of,  to 
have  been  the  person,  and  understand  what  is  said  in  Isa.  xxii. 
21,  of  the  robe  and  the  girdle,  which  he  was  to  put  on,  as 
meant  of  the  pontitical  robe  and  girdle  ;  and  therefore  infer 
from  hence,  that  he  was  high-priest  •,  and  ""  St.  Jerome  and 
St.  Cyril,  among  the  ancients,  were  both  of  this  opinion.  And 
it  must  be  said,  that  what  is  there  prophesied  of  him  by 
Isiaiah,  that  God  would  commit  the  government  of  the  state 
to  his  hands  in  the  room  of  Shebna,  who  was  chief  minster 
before  him  ;  and  that  he  should  be  a  father  to  the  inhabitants 
of  Jerusalem,  and  to  the  house  of  Judah  ;  and  that  the  key 
of  the  house  of  David  should  be  laid  upon  his  shoulder,  to 
open  and  to  shut  without  control,  as  he  should  think  fit,  doth 
very  well  agree  with  that  part  which  Joakim  is  said  to  have 
acted  in  the  book  of  Judith.  But  that  he  was  the  same  per- 
son, is  what  I  durst  not  from  that  which  is  brought  to  prove 
it  lay  much  stress  upon  ;  neither  is  there  any  need  of  it  for 
the  satisfying  of  this  objection,  what  I  have  else  said  being 
sufficient  for  it. 

2dly,  As  to  the  objection  from  ch.  iv.  ver.  3,  of  Juditli, 
■and  from  the  speech  of  Anciiior,  (ch.  v.  ver.  18,)  the  words 
on  which  they  are  founded  are  not  in  Jerome's  version  ; 
and  therefore  it  is  most  likely  they  were  put  into  the  Greek 
version  (from  whence  the  English  is  taken)  fiom  some  of 
those  corrupted  copies  of  the  original  wliich  Jerome  com- 
plains of:  for  in  his  version  (which  he  made  from  th.e  best 
corrected  copies  of  the  original  Chaldee,)  ver.  3,  of  chapter 
iv.  is  wholly  left  out,  as  are  also  tiiose  words  of  ch.  v.  ver.  1 0, 
which  speak  of  the  temple's  havijig  hem  cast  to  the,  gronncl. 

c  2  Chron.  xix.  11.  d  Tn  Esaiain  \\\\ 


'\3^  CONNEXION  «F  THE  IHSTORY  OF  [PART   r. 

And  although  there  be  words  still  remaining  in  Jerome's 
version,  as  well  as  in  our  English,  which  speak  of  the  capti- 
vity and  dispersion  of  ihc  Jews,  and  their  late  restoration 
again  to  their  own  land  ;  yet  they  are  none  other  than  what 
iBay  be  better  understood  of  the  Assyrian  captivity,  in  the 
time  of  Manasseh,  than  of  the  Babylonish  which  happened 
afterward.  As  to  the  third  objection,  it  is  possible  Manasseh 
might  be  then  engaged  in  the  delence  of  some  other  part  of 
his  kingdom,  and  therefore  had  entrusted  Joakim  with  the 
management  of  all  alTairs  at  Jerusalem  during  his  absence. 
And  if  he  were  the  Ehakim  mentioned  in  the  twenty-second 
chapter  of  Isaiah,  and,  as  chief  minister  of  state,  was  then  in- 
vested with  all  that  amplitude  of  trust  and  power  as  is  there 
described,  that  might  be  reason  enough  for  him  only  to  be 
made  mention  of  in  this  transaction,  without  naming  of  his 
jnaster  at  all  therein. 

But,  lastly,  To  give  a  satisfactory  answer  to  the  fourth  ob- 
jection, 1  must   confess  is  not  in  my  power.     Could  we  put 
this  history  so  far  back  as  the  minority  of  Manasseh,  this  would 
not  only  afford  us  an  answer  lo  this  objection,  but  would  also 
give  us  a  much  clearer  orje  to  the  last  preceding.     For,  then 
there  would  be  reason  enough,  not  to  mention  the  minor  king, 
l-)Ut  only  the  chief  minister  and  guardian  of  the  kingdom,  in 
the  transacting  of  the  whole  affair  :  and  the  death  of  Judith 
would,  on  this  supposition,  be  at  such  a  distance  from  the  de 
struction  of  the  Jewish  state,  as  not  to  make  this  objection 
unanswerable.     But  the  wickedness  of  the  pupil  will  not  al- 
low him  to  have  been  bred  under  so  good  a  man  for  his  go- 
vernor, as  Eliakim  is  described  to  be.  And  what  is  said  in  the 
eighteenth   and    nineteenth    verses   of  the   liflh   chapter  of 
,fudith,  concerning  the  captivity  and  restoration  of  the  Jews, 
and  is  retained  also  in  Jerome's  version,  must  necessarily  re- 
fer the  matters  therein  related  (o  those  times  which  followed 
the  captivity  of  Manasseh,  and  the  restoration  of  him  and  his 
people  again  to  their  own  land.  And  the  chronology  of  this 
history  will  not  permit  the  bcgiiming  of  it  to  fall  any  where 
else,  but  in  the  tv;elfth  year  of  Saosduchinus,  and  the  last  of 
Deioces;   and  these  two  characters  of  the  time  exactly  con- 
curring, according  to  Herodotus  and   Ptolemy,  do  unavoida- 
bly determine  us  to  fix   it  here.     However,    our  not    being 
able  to  clear  this  difficulty,  is  not  a  sufficient  reason  for  us 
to   reject   the    whole   history.     There  is   scarce   any    his- 
tory written,   but  what,  to  the  next   age   after,    may   ap- 
pear, as  to  time,  place,  and  other  circumstances,  v.'ith  those 
seeming  inconsistencies,  as  cannot   then   be   easily   recon- 
ciled, when  the  memory  of  men   begin  to  fail  concerning 
them.     And  how  mueb  more  then,  may  wc  be  apt  to  blunder 


BOOK  1.]       TIXE   OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS'.  133 

when  we  take  our  view  at  the  distance  of  above  two  thou- 
sand _years,  and  liave  no  other  hght  to  discern  the  so  far  dis- 
tant object  b}',  than  such  ghmmerings  from  broken  scraps  of 
history,  as  leave  us  next  door  to  groping  in  the  dark  for  what- 
soever knowledge  we  get  by  them  ?  That  which  seemeth 
most  probable  in  this  case  is,  that  the  writer  of  this  book, 
the  more  to  magnify  his  heroine,  attributed  too  long  a  con- 
tinuance to  that  peace,  which  was  by  her  obtained  for  the 
land  :  for,  according  to  this  account,®  it  must  have  lasted  at 
least  eighty  years  :  which  being  what  they  never  had  enjoyed 
from  the  time  they  were  a  natioji,  or  what  scarce  any  other 
liation  ever  had,  I  would  rather  choose  to  allow  a  fiction  in 
this  particular,  than  for  the  sake  of  it  condemn  the  whole 
book  as  such,  which  seemeth  to  carry  with  it  the  air  of  a 
true  history  in  all  other  particulars. 

However,  I  must  acknowledge,  thai  what  is  above  said  in 
the  defence  of  this  book,  for  its  being  a  true  history,  doth  not 
so  far  clear  the  matter,  especially  in  respect  of  the  fourth  ob- 
jection, but  that  if  any  one  will  still  contend,  that  it  is  only  a 
religious  romance,  and  not  a  true  history  :  that,  according  to 
the  intention  of  the  author,  the  scene  of  it  was  under  the 
reign  of  Xerxes,  when  Joakim,*^  the  son  of  Joshua,  was  high- 
priest,  and  the  civil  government  of  Judea,  as  well  as  the  ec- 
clesiastical, was  in  the  hands  of  thatotHcer  ;  and  that  the  in- 
consistency of  so  many  particulars  in  that  book,  with  the 
state  and  transactions  of  those  times,  was  only  from  the  igno- 
rance of  the  author  in  the  history  of  the  said  times,  and  his 
unskilfulness  in  placing  the  scene  of  his  story  in  them  ; 
I  say,  if  any  one  will  insist  on  all  this,  notv/ithslanding  what 
is  above  said,  I  shall  not  enter  into  any  controversy  with 
him  about  it ;  only  thus  much  I  must  insist  on,  that  if  it  be  a 
true  history  (which  1  am  inclined  most  to  think,  though  i  will 
not  be  positive  in  it.)  it  can  fall  nosvhere  else,  but  in  the  time 
where  I  have  laid  it. 

After  the  death  of  Deioccs,  Phraortes"  his  son  succeeded 
in  the  kingdom  of  Media,  and  reigned  over  it  twenty-two 
'cars. 

In  the  fifty-first  year  of  Manasseh,  died*^  Saosdu- 
chinus,  king  of  Babylon  and  Assyria,  and  Chyniladanus  Manat'si. 
reigned  in  his  stead. 

e  For,  allowing  her  to  have  been  forty-five  years  old  at  the  time  of  her 
killing  Holofernes,  there  must  be  sixty  years  after  to  the  time  of  her  death, 
and  "  a  long  time  after"  in  the  text,  (Judith  svi.  25,)  cannot  imply  less  than 
twenty  years  more.  Bui  if  we  sui)pose  her  to  be  but  twenty-five  at  the  kill- 
ing of  Holofernes,  (which  is  more  likely)  it  will  carry  down  the  computation 
even  beyond  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem,  which  makes  the  objection  much 
stronger.  f  IS'eh.  xii.  10,  26. 

<'  H'^rodotu?,  lib.  I,  h  Canon  Ptolema'i, 


134  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OP  [I'ART  i. 

Manasseh,  king  of  Judah,  after  he  had  reigned  fifty-five 
years,  and  lived  sixty-seven,'  died  at  Jerusalem ;  and  not- 
withstanding; his  signal  repentance,  since  his  former 
Manat.%5.  wickedness  had  been  so  great,  they  would  not  allow 
him  the  honour  of  being  buried  in  the  sepulchres  of 
of  the  sons  of  David,  but  laid  him  in  a  grave  made  for  him  in 
his  own  garden. 

After  Manasseh,  reigned  Amon  his  son  ;  who,  imitating  the 
first  part  of  his  father's  reign,   rather  than  the  latter,  gave 
himself  up  to  all  manner  of  wickedness  and  impiety  ; 
Amon^i*."    vvhereon  the  servants  of  his  house   conspired  against 
him,  and  slew  him,  after  he  had  reigned  two  years. 
But  the  people  of  the  land  severely  revenged  the  murder; 
putting  them  all  to  death  that  had  any  hand  in  it.     However, 
they  would  not  give  him  in  his  burial  the  honour  of  a  place 
among  the  sepulchres  of  the  sons  of  David,  but  buried  him 
in  the  garden  by  his  father  ;  which  shows,  that  though  they 
condemned  the  wickedness  of  his  reign,  they  would  not  allow 
of  the  violence  that  was  offered  to  his  person  ;  though  it  may 
well  be  supposed  that  nothing  less  than  the  highest  tyranny 
and  oppression  could  have  provoked  his  own  domestics  to  it. 
After  the  death  of  Amon,  Josiah'^  his  son  succeeded   him 
in  the  kingdom,  being  then  but  eight  years  old.     But 
josiah"!.  having  the  happiness  to  fall  under  the  conduct  of  bet- 
ter guardians  in  his  minority,  than  did   Manasseh  his 
grandfather,  he  proved,  when  grown  up,  a  prince  of  very  ex- 
traordinary worth;  equalling  in  piety,  virtue,  and  goodness, 
if  not  exceeding  herein,  the  best  of  his  predecessors. 

Although  Amon  reigned  but  two  years,  yet  the  beginning 
of  the  reign  of  Josiah  is  here  put  at  the  distance  of  three 
years  from  the  beginning  of  the  first  year  of  Amon,  because  the 
odd  months  of  the  reign  of  Hezekiah,  Manasseh,  and  Amon, 
over  and  above  the  round  number  of  years,  which  they  arc 
said  to  have  reigned,  do  by  this  time  amount  to  a  whole  year 
more,  which  the  chronology  of  the  ensuing  history  makes 
necessary  to  be  here  supposed. 

In  the  sixth  year  of  Josiah  Phraorles,^  king  of  Media,  ha- 
ving brought  under  him  all  the  upper  Asia  (which  is 
Josiah  a  a'l  that  lay  north  of  Mount  Taurus,  from  Media  to 
the  river  Halys,)and  made  the  Persians  also  to  become 
subject  unto  him,  elated  his  thoughts  on  these  successes,  to 
the  revenging  of  himself  upon  the  Assyrians  for  his  father's 
death,  and  accordingly  marched  with  a  great  army  against 
them,  and  having  made  himself  master  of  the  country,  laid 

i  2  Kincs  xxi.  IS.  2  Chrou.  xxiii.  20.        k  2  King?  xxii.  2  Cbron.  xx\iv 
I  T-IeroHotnf^  lib.  1. 


BOOK  1. 3  'IHB  OLD  ANJJ  NEW  TESlAMEiSiTS.  IS5 

siege  to  Nineveh  itself,  the  capital  of  the  empire.  But  he 
had  there  the  misfortune  to  meet  with  the  same  ill  fate 
that  his  father  had  in  the  former  war;  for,  being  overthrown 
in  the  attempt,  he  and  all  his  army  perished  in  it. 

Josiah,  in  the  eighth  year  o(  his  reign,™  being  now  sixteen 
years  old,  took  on  him  the  administration  of  the  king- 
dom, and,  beginning  with  the  reformation  of  religion,  jo^iah^l'. 
endeavoured  to  purge  it  of  all  those  corruptions,  which 
had  been  introduced  in  the  time  of  Amonand  Manasseh,  his 
father  and  grandfather;  and  did  set  his  heart  to  seek  the 
Lord  his  God  with  all  his  might,  as  did  David  his  father. 

Cyaxares,  the  son  of  Phraortes,"  having  succeeded  his 
father  in  the  kingdom  of  Media,  as  soon  as  he  had  well  set- 
tled himself  in  the  government,  drew  together  a  great  army 
to  be  revenged  on  the  Assyrians  for  the  late  loss,  and,  having 
overthrown  them  in  a  great  battle,  led  the  Medes  the  second 
time  to  the  siege  of  Nineveh  ;  but,  before  he  could  make  any 
progress  therein,  he  was  called  otf  to  defend  his  own  territo- 
ries against  a  new  enemy.  For  the  Scythians,  from  the  parts 
about  the  Palus  Meotis,  passing  round  the  Caucasus,  had  made 
a  great  inroad  upon  them  ;  whereby  he  was  forced  to  leave 
Nineveh  to  march  against  them.  But  he  had  not  the  same 
success  in  this  war,  which  he  had  against  the  Assyrians  ;  for 
the  Scythians,  having  vanquished  him  in  battle,  dispossessed 
him  of  all  the  upper  Asia,  and  reigned  there  twenty  eight 
years  ;  during  which  time,  they  enlarged  their  conquests  into 
Syria,  and  as  far  as  the  borders  of  Egypt.  But  there  Psam- 
mitichus,  king  of  Egypt,  having  met  them,  prevailed  with  en- 
treaties and  large  gifts,  that  they  proceeded  no  farther,  and 
thereby  saved  his  country  from  this  dangerous  invasion.  In 
ihis  expedition,  they  seized  on  Bethshean,"  a  city  in  the  ter- 
ritories of  the  tribe  of  Manasseh  on  this  side  Jordan,  and 
kept  it  as  long  as  they  continued  in  Asia  ;  and  therefore,  from 
them  it  was  afterward  called  Cythopolis,  or  the  city  of  the 
Scythians.  But  how  far  the  ravages  of  those  barbarians  might 
affect  Judea  is  nowhere  said,  although  there  can  be  no  doubt, 
but  that  those  parts,  as  well  as  the  rest  of  Palestine,  both  in 
their  march  to  the  borders  of  Egypt,  and  also  in  their  return 
from  thence,  must  have  suffered  much  by  them.  It  is  related 
of  them,  that  in  their  passage  throigh  the  land  of  the  Philis- 
tines, on  their  return  from  Egypt,  some  of  the  stragglers  rob- 
bed the  temple  of  Venus  at  Askelo  >,°  and  that  for  the  pu- 
nishment hereof  they  and  their  posterity  were  afflicted  with 
cmerods  for  a  long  while  after;  which  lets  us  know,  that  thc 

m  2  Chron.  xxxiv.  3.  n  Herodotus  lib.  1 . 

o  SynccUus,  p.  214 


136  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  or  [PARTI. 

Philistines  had  till  then  still  preserved  the  memory  of  what 
they  had  formerly  sutleredon  the  account  of  the  ark  of  God.*! 
For,  from  that  time,  it  seems,  they  looked  on  this  disease  as 
the  proper  punishment  from  the  hand  of  God,  for  all  such  like 
sacrilegious  impieties :  and  for  this  reason  assigned  it  to  the 
Scythians  in  their  histories,  on  their  charging  of  them  there 
with  this  crime. 

Josiah,  in  the  twelfth  year  of  his  reign, *■  being  now  twenty 
years  old,  and  having  farther  improved  himself  in  the 
juaiaM^ii  knowledge  of  God  and  his  laws,  proceeded  according 
hereto  farther  to  perfect  that  reformation  which  he 
had  begun.  And  therefore  making  a  strict  inquiry,  by' a 
ganeral  progress  through  the  land,  after  all  the  relics  of  ido- 
latry which  might  be  any  where  remaining  therein,  he  broke 
down  all  the  altars  of  Baalim,  with  the  idols  erected  on  high 
before  them,  and  all  the  high  places,  and  cut  down  the  groves, 
and  broke  in  pieces  all  the  carved  images,  and  the  molten 
images,  and  digged  up  the  graves  of  the  idolatrous  priests, 
and  burned  their  bones  upon  all  places  of  idolatrous  wor- 
ship, thereby  to  pollute  and  detile  them  for  ever  ;  and  when 
he  had  thus  cleansed  all  Judah  and  Jerusalem,  he  went  into 
the  cities  of  Ephraim  and  Manasseh,  and  all  the  rest  of  the 
land,  that  had  formerly  been  possessed  by  the  ten  tribes  of 
Israel  (for  all  this  was  then  subject  to  him,)  and  there  did  the 
same  thing. 

In  the  thirteenth  year  of  Josiah,  'Jeremiah  was  called  to 
the  prophetic  office,  which  he  afterward  executed  for 
j^iah^^s'  above  forty  years,  in  warning  Judah  and  Jerusalem  of 
the  wrath  of  God  impending  on  them  for  their  iniqui- 
ties, and  in  calling  ihem  to  repentance  for  the  averting  of  it: 
till  at  length,  on  their  continuing  wholly  obdurate  in  their 
evil  ways,  it  was  poured  out  in  full  measure  upon  both  in  a 
most  calamitous  destruction. 

In  the  fifteenth  year  of  Josiah,  Chyniladanus  king  of  Baby- 
lon and  Assyria,  having,  by  his  efi'eminacy  and  unpro- 
.T^siahi5  fitableness  in  the  state,  made  himself  contemptible  to 
his  people,  Nabopolassar,*  who  was  general  of  his 
army,  took  this  advantage  to  set  up  for  himself,  and,  being  a 
Babylonian  by  birth,  made  use  of  his  interest  there  to  seize 
that  part  of  the  Assyrian  empire,  and  reigned  king  of  Baby- 
lon twenty-one  years. 

Josiah,"  in  the  eighteenth  year  of  his  reign,  took  especial 

p  1  Sara.  V.  r  2  Chronn.  xxxiv.  3,  4,  5,  Stc. 

s  Jer.  i.  2  ;  atid  xxv.  3. 
t  Alexander  Tolyliislor  apud  Eusebium  in  Clironico.  p.  4»i,  et  apud  Syn- 
cellum.  p.  210.  'i  2  Kings  xxii.  2  Chron.  xxxiv. 


BOOK  I.]     THE  OLD  AN1»  NEW  TESTAMENTa.  137 

care  for  the  rcpairino;  of  the  house  of  God,  and  there- 

.  •  An    fi5r 

fore  sent  several  of  the  chief  officers  of  his  court  to  j^^i^l^  is' 
take  an  account  of  the  money  collected  for  it,  and  to 
lay  his  command  upon  Hilkiah  the  high-priest,  that  he  should 
see  it  be  forthwith  laid  out  in  the  doing  of  the  work  ;  so  that 
all  might  be  put  in  thorough  repair.  The  high-priest,  in  pur- 
suance of  this  order,  took  a  general  view  of  the  house,  to  see 
what  was  necessary  to  be  done  ;  and,  while  he  was  thus  exa- 
mining every  place,  he  found  the  authentic  copy  of  the  law 
of  Moses.  This  ought  to  have  been  laid  up  on  the  side  of  the 
ark  of  the  covenant  in  the  most  holy  place  ',^  but  it  was  taken 
out  thence  and  hid  elsewhere  in  the  time  of  Manasseh,  as  it 
is  conjectured,  that  it  might  not  be  destroyed  by  him  in  the 
time  of  his  iniquity.  This  book  Hilkiah  sent  to  the  king  by 
Shaphan  the  scribe,  who,  on  his  delivering  it  to  the  king,  did, 
by  his  command,  read  some  part  of  it  to  him.  The  place, 
which  on  the  opening  of  the  book  he  happened  on,  was  (say 
the  Jewish  doctors)  that  part  of  the  twenty-eighth  chapter  of 
Deuteromony,  wherein  are  denounced  the  curses  of  God 
against  the  people  of  Israel,  and  against  the  king  in  particular, 
(verse  26,)  in  case  they  should  not  keep  the  law  which  he 
had  commanded  them.  On  the  hearing  of  this  Josiah  rent 
his  clothes  through  grief,  and  was  seized  with  great  consterna- 
tion, on  the  account  both  of  himself  and  his  people,  as  know- 
ing how  much  they  and  their  fathers  had  transgressed  this  law, 
and  dreading  the  curses  denounced  against  them  for  it.  To 
ease  his  mind  under  this  trouble  and  anxiety  of  his  thoughts, 
he  sent  Hilkiah  the  high-priest  with  several  of  his  officers  to 
Huldah  the  prophetess,  to  inquire  of  the  Lord.  The  answer 
which  they  brought  back,  was  a  sentence  of  destruction  upon 
Judah  and  Jerusalem  ;  but  that  as  to  Josiah,  because  of  his 
repentance,  the  execution  of  it  should  be  delayed  till  after 
his  days.  However,  the  good  king,  to  appease  the  wrath  of 
God  as  much  as  lay  in  his  power,  called  together  a  solemn 
assembly  of  all  the  elders  and  people  of  Judah  and  Jerusa- 
lem ;  and,  going  up  with  them  to  the  temple,  caused  the  law 
of  God  to  be  there  read  to  them,  and  after  that  both  king  and 
people  publicly  entered  into  a  solemn  covenant  to  walk  after 
the  Lord,  and  to  keep  his  commandments,  and  his  testimonies, 
and  his  statutes,  with  all  their  heart  and  all  their  soul ;  and 
to  perform  all  the  words  of  the  covenant  that  were  written 
in  that  book.  And  after  this  he  made  another  progress 
through  the  land  to  purge  it  of  all  other  abominations  of 
idolatry  or  other  wickedness,  which  might  be  still  remaining 
in  it,  which  he  thoroughly  rooted  out  in  all  parts  of  his  king- 

X  Deut.  xxxi.  26. 
Vol.  T-  IB 


13fi  CONNEXION  OP*  THi?  HISTOKY  OF  [i'ART  /, 

dom  in  such  manner,  as  is  in  the  twenty-third  chapter  of  the 
second  book  of  Kings  at  large  related.  And  particularly 
he  destroyed  the  altar  and  high  place,  which  Jeroboam  had 
bjiilt  at  Bethel,  first  polluting  them  by  burning  on  them  the 
bones  of  men  taken  out  of  their  sepulchres  near  adjoining, 
and  then  breaking  down  the  aUarand  burning  the  high  place 
and  the  grove,  and  stamping  them  all  to  powder;  whereby 
he  fulfilled  what  had  been  prophesied^  of  him  by  name  many 
ages  before  in  the  time  of  Jeroboam.  And  he  did  the  same  in 
all  the  rest  of  the  cities  of  Samaria,  destroying  every  remain- 
der of  idolatry,  which  he  couid  any  where  find  in  any  of 
them.  And  whenthenext  passoverapproached.hecaused  that 
feast  to  be  kept  with  so  great  a  solemnity  and  concourse  of 
people  from  ail  parts  of  the  land,  that  it  not  only  exceeded 
the  passover  of  Hezekiah,  which  is  afore  mentioned,  but  all 
other  passovers  from  the  days  of  Samuel  the  prophet  to  that 
time. 

By  the  behaviour  both  of  the  high-priest,  as  well  as  of  the 
king,  at  the  finding  of  the  book  of  the  law,  it  plainly  appears, 
that  neither  of  them  had  seen  any  copy  of  it  before;  which 
shows  into  how  corrupt  a  state  the  church  of  the  Jews  was 
then  sunk,  till  this  good  king  reformed  it ;  for  although  Heze- 
kiah' kept  scribes  on  purpose  to  collect  together  and  write 
out  copies  of  the  holy  Scriptures,  yet,  through  the  iniquity 
of  the  times  that  after  followed  in  the  reigns  of  Manassehand 
Amon,  they  had  either  been  so  destroyed,  or  else  so  neglect- 
ed and  lost,  that  there  were  then  none  of  them  left  in  the 
land,  unless  in  some  few  private  hands,  where  they  were  kept 
up  and  concealed  till  this  copy  was  found  in  the  temple  ;  and 
therefore,  after  this  time  (by  the  care  we  may  be  assured,  of 
this  religious  prince,)  were  written  out  those  copies  of  the 
law  and  other  holy  Scriptures  then  in  being,  which  were  pre- 
served after  the  captivity,  and  out  of  which  Ezra  made  his 
edition  of  them,  in  such  a  manner  as  will  be  hereafter  related. 
Ir)  the  twenty-fourth  year  of  Josiah,  died  Psam- 
jos"ah24.  mitichus,^  king  of  Egypt,  after  he  had  reigned  fifty- 
four  years,  and  was  succeeded  by  Necus,  bis  son.  the 
same  who  in  Scripture  is  called  Pharaoh  Necho,  and  often 
mentioned  there  under  that  name.  He  made  an  attempt  to 
join  the  Nile  and  the  Red  Sea,  by  drawing  a  canal  from  the  one 
to  the  other ;  but,  after  he  had  consumed  an  hundred  and 
twenty  thousand  men  in  the  work,  he  was  forced  to  desist 
from  it.  But  he  had  better  success  in  another  undertaking; 
for,  having  gotten  some  of  the  expertest  of  the  Phoenician 
sailors   into  his  service,  he**  sent  them  out  by  the  Red  Sea 

y  2  Kings  xiii.  2.  z  Prov.  xxv.  1.  a  Herodotus,  lib.  1 

b  Herodotus,  lib.  4. 


BOOK  I.]        THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  139 

through  the  straits  of  Babelmandel,  to  discover  the  coasts 
of  Africa  :  who,  having  sailed  round  it,  came  home  the  third 
year  through  the  straits  of  Gibraltar,  and  the  Mediterranean 
Sea,  which  was  a  very  extraordinary  voyage  to  be  made  in 
those  days  when  the  use  of  the  loadstone  was  not  known. 
This  voyage  was  performed  about  two  thousand  one  hundred 
years  before  Vasquez  de  Gama,  a  Portuguese,  by  discover- 
ing the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  A.  D.  1497,  found  out  the  same 
way  from  hence  to  the  Indies,  by  which  these  Phoenicians 
came  from  thence.  Since  that,  it  hath  been  made  the  com- 
mon passage  thither  from  all  these  western  parts  of  the 
world. 

In  the  twenty-ninth  year  of  the  reign  of  Josiah,  which 
was  the  twenty-third  of  Cyaxares  in  the  kingdom  of 
Media,  "^  Nabopolassar,  king  of  Babylon,  having  madej^";ah*^ 
an  affinity  with  Astyages,  the  eldest  son  of  Cy- 
axares, by  the  marriage  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  his  son,  with 
Amyitis,  the  daughter  of  Astyages,  entered  into  a  confede- 
racy with  him  against  the  Assyrians  ;  and,  thereon  joining  their 
forces  together,  they  besieged  Nineveh;  and  after  having 
taken  the  place,  and  slain  Saracus  the  king  (who  was  either 
the  successor  of  Chyniladanus,  or  he  himself  under  another 
name,)  to  gratify  the  Medes  they  utterly  destroyed  that  great 
and  ancient  city  ;  and  from  that  time  Babylon  became  the 
sole  metropolis  of  the  Assyrian  empire.  From  the  time  that 
Esarhaddon  obtained  the  kingdom  of  Babylon,*^  both  cities 
equally  had  this  honour,  the  king  sometimes  residing  at  Nine- 
veh, and  sometimes  at  Babylon;  but  after  this  Nineveh  lost 
it  for  ever  ;  for,  although  there  was  another  city  afterward 
erected  out  of  the  ruins  of  old  Nineveh,  which  for  a  long 
time  bore  the  same  name,  yet  it  never  attained  to  the  gran- 
deur and  glory  of  the  former.  It  is  at  this  day  called  Mosul,^ 
and  is  only  famous  for  being  the  seat  of  the  patriarch  of  the 
Nestorians,  of  which  sect  are  most  of  the  Christians  in  those 
parts.  It  is  situated  on  the  west  side  of  the  river  Tigris, 
where  was  anciently  only  a  suburb  of  the  old  Nineveh  ;  for 
the  city  itself  stood  on  the  east  side  of  the  river,  where  are 
to  be  seen  some  of  its  ruins  of  great  extent  even  unto  this 
day.  According  to  Diodorus  Siculus,*^  the  circuit  of  Nine- 
veh was  four  hundred  and  eighty  furlongs,  which  make  sixty 
of  our  miles.  And  hence  it  is,  that  it  is  said  in  Jonah  to  be 
a  city  5  of  three  days  journey,  that  is,  in  compass,  for  twenty 

c  Eusebii  Chronicon.  p.  124.     Alexander  Polyhistor  apud  Syncellum,  p. 
210,  etapud  Eusebium  in  Chronico.  p.  46.     Herodotus,  lib.  1. 
d  Strabo,  lib.  ]6,  p.  734. 
e  Thevenot's  Travels,  part  2.  book  1,  c.  11,  p.  50. 
fLib.  2.  a:  Jonah  iii.  3. 


140  CONNEXION    OF    THE    HISTORY  OP  [I'ART  i. 

miles  is  as  much  as  a  man  can  well  go  in  a  day.  Strabo'' 
saith  of  it  that  it  was  much  bigger  than  Jiabylon  ;  and  in  the 
same  place  he  tells  us,  that  the  circuit  of  Babylon  was  three 
hundred  and  eighty  five  furlongs,  that  is,  forty-eight  of  our 
miles.  The  phrase  much  bigger  may  well  extend  to  the  other 
twelve  miles  to  make  it  up  sixty. 

In  this  destruction  of  Nineveh  was  fulfilled  the  prophecies 
of  Jonah,'  Nahuin,''  and  Zephariiah,'  against  it.  And  we 
are  told  in  the  book  of  Tobit,™  that  Tobias  his  son  lived  to 
hear  of  it,  and  that  it  was  accomplished  by  Nabuchodonosor 
and  Assuerus,  which  exactly  agrees  with  the  account  which, 
out  of  Alexander  Polyhistor,  1  have  just  above  given  of  it. 
For  that  the  Assuerus  here  mentioned  was  Astyages,  appears 
from  Daniel ;  for  Darius  the  Mede,  who  was  Cyaxares,  the 
son  of  Astyages,  is  there  called  the  son  of  Ahasuerus :"  and 
Nabuchodonosor  was  a  name  among  the  Babylonians  com- 
monly given  to  their  kings,  as  that  of  Pharaoh  was  among  the 
Egyptians.  And  that  Nabopolassar  in  particular  was  so  call- 
ed, not  only  appears  from  "  the  rabbinical  writings  of  the 
Jews,  but  also  from  Josephus  himself,  a  writer,  by  reason  of 
his  antiquity,  of  much  better  authority  in  this  matter.  For, 
in  his  Antiquities,  where  he  is  speaking  of  this  same  king,  he^ 
calls  him  in  a  quotation,  which  is  there  brought  out  of  Bero- 
sus,  by  the  name  of  Nabuchodonosor  ;  and  afterward,i  in  his 
book  against  Apion,  repeating  the  same  quotation,  he  there 
calls  him  Nabullasar,  the  same  by  contraction  with  Nabopo- 
lassar ;  which  plainly  proves  him  to  have  been  called  by 
both  these  names.  I  know  there  are  those  who  take  upon 
them,  from  this  passage  in  the  book  against  Apion,  to  mend 
that  in  the  Antiquities,  and  put  Nabopolassar  in  both  places  ; 
but  I  see  no  reason  for  it  but  their  own  fancy.  Others  may, 
with  as  good  authority,  from  the  passage  in  the  Antiquities, 
mend  that  in  the  boofc  against  Apion,  and  put  Nabuchodono- 
sor in  both  places.  It  is  certain  the  books  of  Tobit  and  Judith 
can  never  be  reconciled  with  any  other  ancient  writings,  either 
sacred  or  profane,  which  relate  to  those  times,  unless  we  al- 
low Nabuchodonosor  to  have  been  i  name  common  to  the 
kings  of  Babylon. 

The  archbishop  of  Armagh'  hath  put  this  destruction  of 

h  Lib.  16,  p.  737.         i  Chap.  iii.        k  Chap.  ii.  k.  iii.        1  Chap.  ii.  13. 

m  Chap.  xiv.  15.  n  Dan.  is.  1. 

o  In  Juchasin,  Nebuchadnezzar  i?  called  Nebuchadnezzar  the  son  of  Ne- 
buchadnezzar, fol.  136,  and  David  Gaoz,  under  the  year  of  the  world  3285, 
calls  the  father  Nebuchadnezzar  the  first,  and  the  son  Nebuchadnezzar 
the  second. 

p  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  11.  q  Lib.  1 

y  In  Annnlibiis  Veteris  'i'e=!anieDti  5ub  anno  niundl. 


BOOK  1.]        THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.         141 

Nineveli  fourteen  years  earlier,  that  is,  in  the  last  year  of 
Chyniladanus  in  t  le  canon  of  Ptolemy,  for  no  other  reason, 
I  suppose,  but  that  he  reckoned  that  the  »  nd  of  his  hfe  and  the 
end  of  his  reign  in  that  canon  happened  ooth  at  the  same  time, 
and  both  together  in  the  destruction  of  that  city  :  whereas,  the 
computation  ofthat  canon  bein^by  the  years  of  the  kings  that 
reigned  at  Babylon,  Chyniladanus's  reign  there  must  end 
where  Nabopolassar's  begun,  whether  he  then  died  or  not, 
as  it  is  most  probable  he  did  not,  but  that  he  continued  to 
hold  the  kingdom  of  Assyria  after  he  had  lost  that  of  Baby- 
lon, and  that  it  was  not  till  some  time  after  that  loss  that 
Nineveh  was  destroyed  :  for  Eusebius  placeth  the  destruc- 
tion of  Nineveh  in  the  twenty-third  year  of  the  reign  of  Cy- 
axares  ;  and  to  put  it  back  fourteen  years,  to  the  last  of  Chy- 
niladanus in  the  canon,  will  make  it  fall  in  the  ninth  year  of 
Cyaxares,  which  is  too  early  for  his  son  Astyages  to  have  a 
daughter  marriageable,  or  for  Nebuchadnezzar  to  be  of  age 
sufHcient  to  take  her  to  wife  :  for  after  this  rate,  Nebuchad- 
nezzar must  be  allowed  to  have  been'  at  the  least  eighty-five 
years  old  at  the  time  of  his  death,  and  Astyages  much  older, 
which  is  an  age  very  unlikely  for  such  to  live,  who  usually 
waste  their  lives,  both  by  luxury  and  fatigue,  much  faster  than 
other  men. 

At  the  destruction  of  this  city  of  Nineveh  ended  the  book 
of  Tobit.  It  was  first  written  in  Chaldee'  by  some  Babylo- 
nian Jew,  and  seems,  in  its  original  draught,  to  have  been  the 
memoirs  of  the  family  to  which  it  relates  ;  first  begun  by 
Tobit,  then  continued  by  Tobias,  and  lastly  finished  by  some 
other  of  the  family,  and  afterward  digested  by  the  Chaldee 
author  into  that  form  in  which  we  now  have  it.  Jerome" 
translated  it  out  of  the  Chaldee  into  Latin,  and  his  transla- 
tion is  that  which  we  have  in  the  vulgar  Latin  edition  of  the 
Bible.  But  there  is  a  Greek  version  much  ancienter  than 
this;  for  we  find  it  made  use  of  by  Polycarp,  Clemens  Alex- 
andrinus,  and  other  fathers,  who  were  before  Jerome  ;  and 
from  this  hath  been  made  the  Syriac  version,  and  also  that 
which  we  have  in  English  among  the  apocryphal  writers  in 
our  Bible.  But  the  CIi  ildee  original  is  not  now  extant.  The 
Hebrew  copies  which  go  about  of  this  book,  as  well  as  that 
of  Judith,  seem  both  to  be  of  a  modern  composure.  It  be- 
ing easier  to  settle  the  chronology  of  this  book  than  that  of 

s  For,  according  to  this  account,  this  marriage  must  have  been  twenty-one 
years  before  Nebuchadnezzar  began  to  reign,  and  he  reigned  forty-three 
years  ;  and  it  must  also  have  been  thirty-one  years  before  Astyages  began 
to  reign,  and  he  reigned  thirty  years. 

t  Prajfatio  Hieronymi  in  Tobiatn. 
u  They  are  generally  thought  to  have  been  made  by  Munster. 


142  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART  I. 

the  book  of  Judith,  it  hath  met  with  much  less  opposition 
from  learned  men,  and  is  generally  looked  on,  both  by  Jews 
and    Christians,  as  a  genuine  and  true  history;  though,  as 
to  some  matters  in  it  (as  particularly  that  of  the  angel's   ac- 
companying of  Tobias  in  a  long  journey  under  the  shape  of 
Azarias,  the  story  of  Raguel's  daughter,  the  frighting  away 
of  the  devil  by  the  smoke   of  Ihe  heart  and  liver  of  a  fish, 
and  the  curing  of  Tobit's   blindness  by  the  gall  of  the  same 
fish.)  it  is  much  less  reconcileable  to  a  rational  credibility; 
for  these  things  look  more  like  the   fictions  of  Homer  than 
the   writings   of  a  sacred  historian,   and  give  an  objection 
against  this  book  which  doth  not  lie  against  the  other.   How- 
ever, it  may  excellently  well  serve  to  represent  unto  us  the 
duties  of  charity  and  patience,   m   the   example  of  Tobit's 
ready  helping  his   brethren  in  distress  to  the  utmost  of  his 
power,  and  his  boiring  with  a  pious  submission  the  calami- 
ties of  his  captivity,  poverty,  and  bimdness,  as  long  as  inflict- 
ed upon  him.     The  Latin  and  Greek  versions  of  this  book, 
which  1  have  mentioned,  do  much  differ,  each  having  some 
particulars  in  it  which  are  wanting  in  (he  other.     But  here 
the  Latin  version  must  give  place  to  the   Greek.     F'or  Je- 
rome^ made  it,  before  he  himself  understood  Chaldee,  by  the 
help  of  a   learned  Jew,  from  whose  mouth,  he  tells  us,  he 
wrote  down  in  Latin  what  the  other  rendered  into  Hebrew 
from  the   original,  and  in   this   manner  finished   the  whole 
work  in  one  day's  time  ;  and  a  work  so  done  must  undoubt- 
edly have  abundance  of  mistakes  as  well  as  inaccuracies  in 
it.     But    his    translation  of  Judith^  was    made    afterward, 
when,  by  his  farther  studies  in  the  oriental    languages,  he 
had  rendered  himself  as  much  master  of  the  Chaldee  as  he 
was  before   of  the  Hebrew  ;  and  he  did  it  with  great  care, 
comparing    diligently    many    various    copies,    and    making 
use  only  of  such  as  he  found  to  be  the  best ;  and  therefore 
his  version  of  that  book  may  well  deserve  an  authority  be- 
yond the  Greek,  which  cannot  be  claimed  for  the  other.      If 
the  copy  which  Jerome  translated  his  Tobit  from  were  a  true 
copy,  and  he  were  not  mistaken  in  the  version,  there  is  one 
passage  in  it  which  absolutely  overthrows  the  whole  authori- 
ty of  the  book  :  for  (ch.  xiv.  7.)  there  is  mention  made  of  the 
temple  of  Jerusalem  as  then  burned  and  destroyed,  which 
makes  the  whole  of  it  utterly  inconsistent  with  the  times  in 
which  it  is  placed.     The  Greek  version,  as  also  the  English, 
which  is  taken  from  it,  1  acknowledge,  speak  only  propheti- 
cally of  it,  as  of  that  which  was  to  be  done,  and  not  histori- 

X  Hieronytni  Praefatio  in  Tobiam. 
y  Hieronymi  Pra?fatio  in  Libnim  Judith. 


BOOK  1.]       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  143 

cally,  as  of  that  which  was  already  done,  as  Jerome's  doth. 
However,  this  Latin  edition  is  that  which  the  church  of 
Rome  hath  canonized.  If  the  historical  ground-plot  of  the 
book  be  true,  which  is  the  most  that  can  be  said  of  it,  yet 
certainly  it  is  interlarded  with  many  fictions  of  the  invention 
of  him  that  wrote  it. 

The  Babylonians  and  the  Modes  having  thus  destroyed 
Nineveh,  as  is  above  related,  they  became  so  formidable 
hereon,  as  raised  the  jealousy  of  all  their  neighbours;  and 
therefore,  to  put  a  stop  to  their  growing  greatness,  Necho,"- 
king  of  Egypt,  in  the  thirty-first  year  of  king  Josiah,  march- 
ed with  a  great  army  towards  the  Euphrates  to  make  war 
upon  them.  The  words  of  Josephus  are,''  That  it  was  to 
make  war  upon  the  Modes  and  '  Baylonians,  who  had  dissol- 
ved the  Assyrian  empire  ;'  which  plainly  shows,  that  this 
war  was  commenced  immediately  upon  that  dissolution,  and 
consequently,  that  the  destruction  of  Nineveh,  whereby  this 
dissolution  was  brought  to  pass,  was  just  before  this  war,  in 
the  year  where,  according  to  Eusebius,  I  have  placed  it. 

On  Necho's  taking  his  way  through  Judea,  ''Josiah  resol- 
ved to  impede  his  march  ;  and  therefore,  getting  to- 
gether bis  forces,  he  posted  himself  in  the  valley  of  jo'^iah^sf; 
Megiddo,  there  to  stop  his  passage  :  whereon  Necho 
sent  ambassadors  unto  him,  to  let  him  know,  that  he  had  no 
design  upon  him,  that  the  war  he  was  engaged  in  was  against 
others;  and  therefore  advised  him  not  to  meddle  with  him, 
lest  it  should  turn  to  his  hurt.  But  Josiah  not  hearkening 
thereto,  on  Necho's  marching  up  to  the  place  where  he 
was  posted  to  stop  his  passage,  it  there  came  to  a  battle  be- 
tween them;  wherein  Josiah  was  not  only  overthrown,  but 
also  unfortunately  received  a  wound,  of  which,  on  his  return 
to  Jerusalem,  he  there  died,  after  he  had  reigned  thirty-one 
years. 

It  is  the  notion  of  many,  that  Josiah  engaged  rashly  and 
unadvisedly  in  this  war,  upon  an  over  confidence  in  the  me- 
rit of  his  own  righteousness ;  as  if  God.  for  this  reason,  must 
necessarily  have  given  him  success  in  every  war  which  he 
should  engage  himself  in.  But  this  would  be  a  presumption 
very  unworthy  of  so  religious  a  person.  There  was  ano- 
ther reason  that  engaged  him  in  this  undertaking,  which  hath 
been  above  hinted  at.  From  the  time  of  Manasseh's  resto- 
ration, the  kings  of  Judah  were  homagers  to  the  kings  of 
Babylon,  and  bound  by  oath  to  adhere  to  them  against  all 

7.  Herodotus,  lib.  2.     Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  6. 

a  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  6. 

b  2  Kings  xxxiii.  29,  80.    2  Chron.  xxxv.  xx— 25. 


144  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  (, 

Iheir  enemies,  especially  against  the  Egyptians,  and  to  de- 
fend that  border  of  their  empire  against  them;  and  for  this 
purpose,  thej  seem  to  have  had  conferred  on  them  the  rest  of 
the  land  of  Canaan,  that  which  had  formerly  been  possessed 
by  the  other  ten  tribes,  till  conquered  from  them  by  the  As- 
syrians. It  is  certain  Josiah  had  the  whole  land  of  Israel  in 
the  same  extent  in  which  it  had  been  held  by  David  and  So- 
lomon, before  it  was  divided  into  two  kingdoms.  For  his 
reformation  went  through  all  of  it  ;  and  it  was  executed  by 
him,  not  only  in  Bethel,  (where  one  of  Jeroboam's  calves 
stood,)  but  also  in  every  other  part  thereof,  and  with  the 
same  sovereign  authority  as  in  Judea  itself;  and  therefore 
he  must  have  been  king  of  the  whole.  And  it  is  to  be  re- 
marked, that  the  battle  was  fought,  not  within  the  territories 
of  Judea,  but  at  Megiddo,  a  town  of  the  tribe  of  Manasseh, 
lying  in  the  middle  of  the  kingdom  of  Israel,  where  Josiah 
would  have  had  nothing  to  do,  had  he  not  been  king  of  that 
kingdom  also,  as  well  as  of  the  other  of  Judah  :  and  he  could 
have  had  it  no  otherwise,  but  by  grant  from  the  king  of 
Babylon,  a  province  of  whose  empire  it  was  made  by  the 
conquest  of  it,  first  begun  by  Tiglath-Pileser,  and  afterward 
finished  by  Salmaneser  and  Esarhaddon.  And  if  this  grant 
was  not  upon  the  express  conditions  which  I  have  mention- 
ed, yet  whatsoever  other  terms  there  were  of  this  conces- 
sion, most  certainly  fidelity  to  the  sovereign  paramount,  and 
a  steady  adherence  to  his  interest,  against  all  his  enemies, 
was  always  required  in  such  cases,  and  an  oath  of  God  ex- 
acted for  the  performance  hereof.  And  it  is  not  to  be 
doubted,  but  that  Josiah  had  taken  such  an  oath  to  Nabopo- 
lassar,  the  then  reigning  king  of  Babylon,  as  Jehoiakim  and 
Zedekiah  afterward  did  to  Nebuchadnezzar,  his  son  and  suc- 
cessor in  that  empire;  and  therefore,  should  Josiah,  when 
under  such  an  obligation,  have  permitted  an  enemy  of  the 
king  of  Babylon  to  pass  through  his  country  to  make  war 
upon  him,  without  any  opposition,  it  would  plainly  have 
amounted  to  a  breach  of  his  oath,  and  a  violation  of  that 
fidelity  which  he  had  in  the  name  of  his  God  sworn  unto 
him,  which  so  good  and  just  a  man  as  Josiah  was,  could  not 
but  absolutely  detest.  For,  although  the  Romanists  make 
nothing  of  breaking  faith  with  heretics,  yet  the  breaking  of 
faith  with  an  heathen  was  condemned'^  by  God  himself  in 
Jehoiakim  and  Zedekiah  ;  and  most  certainly  it  would  have 
been  condemned  in  Josiah  also,  had  he  become  guilty  of  it; 
which  being  what  a  person  so  well  instructed  in  religion  as 
Josiah  was,  could  not  but  be  thoroughly  convinced  of,  the 

r,  Ezek.  xvi.  13—19. 


BOOK  I.j  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  145 

sense  which  he  had  of  his  duty,  in  this  particular,  seems 
solely  to  have  been  that  which  engaged  him  in  this  war,  in 
which  he  perished  :  and  with  him  perished  all  the  glory,  ho- 
nour, and  prosperity  of  the  Jewish  nation;  for,  after  that, 
nothing  else  ensued  but  a  dismal  scene  of  God's  judgments 
upon  the  land,  till  at  length,  all  Judah  and  Jerusalem  were 
swallowed  up  by  them  in  a  woful  destruction. 

The  death  of  so  excellent  a  prince  was  deservedly  lament- 
ed by  all  his  people,  and  by  none  more  than  by  Jeremiah 
the  prophet,  who  had  a  thorough  sense  of  the  greatness  of 
the  loss,  and  also  a  full  foresight  of  the  great  calamities  that 
were  afterward  to  follow  upon  the  whole  people  of  the 
Jews ;  and  therefore,  while  his  heart  was  full  with  the  view 
of  both,  he  wrote  a  song  of  lamentation*^  upon  this  doleful 
occasion,  as  he  afterward  did  another  upon  the  destruction  of 
Jerusalem.  This  last®  is  that  which  we  still  have ;  the 
other  is  not  now  extant. 

Megiddo,  where  the  battle  was  fought,  was  a  cilj  in  the 
tribe  of  Manasseh,*^  on  this  side  Jordan,  which  is  by  Herodo- 
tus called  Magdolum,  nigh  it  was  the  town  of  Hadad-Rim- 
mon,  afterward  called  Maximianopolis  ;5  and  therefore  the 
lamentation  for  the  death  of  Josiah  is  in  Scripture  called 
the  "Lamentation  of  Hadad-Rimmon  in  the  valley  of  Me- 
giddo," which  was  so  great  for  this  excellent  prince,  and  so 
long  continued,*"  that  the  lamentation  of  Hadad-Rimmon 
afterward  became  a  proverbial  phrase  for  the  expressing  of 
any  extraordinary  sorrow. 

This  great  and  general  mourning  of  all  the  people  of  Is- 
rael for  the  death  of  this  prince,  and  the  prophet  Jeremiah's 
joining  so  pathetically  with  them  herein,  showeth  in  how 
great  a  reputation  he  was  with  them,  which  he  would  not 
have  deserved,  had  he  engaged  in  this  war  contrary  to  the 
words  of  that  prophet,  spoken  to  him  from  the  mouth  of  the 
Lord,  as  the  apocryphal  writer  of  the  first  book  of  Esdras/ 
and  others  from  him,  say  :  for  then  he  would  have  died  in  re- 
bellion against  God,  and  disobedience  to  his  command;  and 
then  neither  God's  prophet,  nor  God's  people,  could  in  this 
case,  without  sinning  against  God,  have  expressed  so  great 
an  esteem  for  him  as  this  mourning  implied  ;  and  therefore 
this  mourning  alone  is  a  sufficient  proof  of  the  contrary. 
Besides,  it  is  to  be  observed,  that  no  part  of  canonical  Scrip- 
ture gives  us  the  least  intimation  of  it ;  nor  can  we  from 

d  2  Chron.  xxxv.  26. 
e  This  last,  referring  throughout  to  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem,  could 
not  be  that  which  was  wrote  upon  the  death  of  Josiah. 
fJoshxvii.il.    Judges  i.  37.  g  Hieronymus 

h  Zech.  xii.  11  i  Chap,  i,  28. 

Vol.  I.  19 


146  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  K 

thence  have  any  reason  or  ground  to  believe  that  there  was 
any  such  word  from  the  Lord  by  the  prophet  Jeremiah,  or 
any  other  prophet,  to  recall  Josiah  from  this  war.  All  that 
is  said  of  it  is  from  the  apocryphal  book  I  have^mentioned ; 
of  which  it  may  be  truly  said,  that  where  it  is  not  a  transcript 
from  Ezra,  or  some  other  canonical  Scripture,  it  is  no  more 
than  a  bundle  of  fables,  too  absnrd^for  the  belief  of  the  Ro- 
manists themselves,  (for  they  have  not  taken  this  book  into 
their  canonical  Scripture,  though  they  have  those  of  Tobit 
and  of  Bel  and  the  Dragon  ;)  and  therefore  it  is  deserving  of 
no  man's  regard  in  this  particular. 

It  is  said  indeed  (2  Chron.  xxxv.  21,)  that  Necho  sent 
messengers  to  Josiah,  to  tell  him,  that  he  was  sent  of  God  on 
this  expedition  ;  that  God  was  with  him  in  it;  and  that  to 
meddle  with  him  would  be  to  meddle  with  God  ;  and  that 
therefore  he  ought  to  forbear,  that  God  destroy  him  not ; 
and  (verse  22,)  that  Josiah  hearkened  not  to  the  word  of 
Necho  from  the  mouth  of  God.  And,  from  all  this  put  to- 
gether, some  would  infer,  that  Josiah  was  disobedient  to  the 
word  of  God  in  going  to  that  war.  But  this  is  utterly  incon- 
sistent with  the  character  which  is  given  us  in  Scripture  of 
that  religious  and  excellent  prince;  and  therefore  what  is 
here  said  must  not  be  understood  of  the  true  God,  the  Lord 
Jehovah,  who  was  the  God  of  Israel,  but  of  the  Egyptian  gods, 
whose  oracles  Josiah  had  no  reason  to  have  any  regard  to. 
For  Necho,  being  an  heathen  prince,  knew  not  the  Lord 
Jehovah,  nor  ever  consulted  his  prophets  or  his  oracles: 
the  Egyptian  gods  were  those  only  whom  he  worshipped, 
and  whose  oracles  he  consulted  ;  and  therefore  when  he 
saith  he  was  sent  of  God  on  this  expedition,  and  that  God 
was  with  him,  he  meant  none  other  than  his  false  Egyptian 
gods,  whom  he  served:  for,  wherever  the  word  God  oc- 
curs in  this  text,  it  is  not  expressed  in  the  Hebrew  original 
by  the  word  Jehovah,  which  is  the  proper  name  of  the  true 
God,  but  by  the  word  Elohim,  which  being  in  the  plural  num- 
ber, is  equally  applicable  to  the  false  gods  of  the  heathens,  as 
well  as  to  the  true  God,  who  was  the  God  of  Israel ;  and,  in 
the  Scriptures  of  the  Old  Testament,  it  is  equally  used  for 
the  expressing  of  the  one  as  well  as  the'other.  For,  where- 
ver there  is  occasion  therein  to  speak  of  those  false  gods,  it 
is  by  the  word  Elohim  that  they  are  there  mentioned.  And, 
whereas  it  is  said  (ver.  22,)  that  "  Josiah  hearkened  not  to 
the  words  of  Necho  from  the  mouth  of  God,"  (and  from 
hence  it  is  chiefly  inferred,  that  the  message  which  Necho 
sent  to  Josiah  was  truly  from  God,)  it  is  to  be  observed,  that 
the  phrase,  which  we  Tender  from  the  mouth  of  God.  is  in  the 


KOOK  1.]        THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  347 

Hebrew  original  Mippi  Elohim,  /.  e.  from  the  mouth  of  Elo- 
him,  which  may  be  interpreted  of  the  false  gods,  as  well  as 
of  the  true  God,  (as  hath  been  already  said,)  and  much  rather, 
in  this  place,  of  the  former  than  of  the  latter.  For,  where- 
ver else,*^  through  the  whole  Hebrew  text  of  the  holy  Scrip- 
tures, there  is  mention  made  of  any  word  coming  from  the 
mouth  of  God,  he  is  there  mentioned  by  the  name  Jehovah, 
which  determines  it  to  be  the  true  God  ;  and  this  is  the  only 
place,  in  the  whole  Hebrew  Bible,  where,  in  the  use  of  this 
phrase,  it  is  expressed  otherwise,  that  is,  by  the  name  Elo- 
him, and  not  by  the  name  Jehovah  ;  which  change  in  the 
phrase,  in  this  place,  is  a  sufficient  proof  to  me,  that  there 
must  be  here  a  change  in  the  signification  also,  and  that  the 
word,  which  is  here  said  to  come  from  the  mouth  of  Elohim, 
is  not  the  same  with  the  word  which  is  every  where  else,  in 
the  use  of  this  phrase  in  Scripture,  said  to  come  from  the 
mouth  of  Jehovah,  but  that  Elohim  must,  in  this  place,  sig- 
nify the  false  gods  of  the  Egyptians ;  and  that  from  their  false 
oracles  only  Necho  had  this  word  which  he  sent  to  Josiah. 
For  what  had  he  to  do  with  any  word  from  the  true  God, 
who  knew  him  not,  nor  ever  worshipped  him  ?  Or  how 
could  any  such  revelation  come  to  him,  who  knew  not  any 
of  his  prophets,  or  ever  consulted  them  ?  And  therefore,  most 
certainly,  the  word  which  is  here  said  to  come  Mippi  Elohim, 
i.  e.  from  the  mouth  of  Elohim,  must  be  understood  only  of 
Necho's  Elohim,  that  is,  of  those  false  Egyptian  gods,  whose 
oracles  he  consulted  before  he  undertook  this  expedition, 
as  it  was  then  usual  with  heathen  princes,  on  such  occasions, 
to  consult  the  false  deluding  oracles  of  the  gods  they  wor- 
shipped. And  had  it  been  here  Mippi  Jehovah,  i.  e.  from 
the  mouth  of  Jehovah,  instead  of  Mippi  Elohim,  consider- 
ing who  sent  the  message,  it  would  not  have  much  mended 
the  matter;  for  Josiah  would  have  had  no  reason  to  believe 
it  from  such  a  messenger.  When  Sennacherib  came  up 
against  Judah,  he  sent  Hezekiah  word,^  that  the  Lord  (Jeho- 
vah in  the  Hebrew)  said  unto  him,  Go  up  against  this  land 
and  destroy  it.  But  it  was  not  reckoned  a  fault  in  Heze- 
kiah, that  he  believed  him  not,  neither  could  it  be  reckoned  a 
fault  in  Josiah  in  doing  the  same.  F'or,  it  is  certain  that  Sen- 
nacherib, in  so  pretending,  lied  to  king  Hezekiah;  and  why 
might  not  Josiah  then  have  as  good  reason  to  conclude  that 
Necho,  in  the  like  pretence,  might  have  lied  also  unto  him  ? 
for  God  used  not  to  send  his  word  to  his  servants  by  such  mes- 

k  See  Deut.  viii.  3.     Josh.  ix.  14.     1  Kings  xiii,  21.     2  Chron.  xxxvi.  12, 
Isa.  i.  20  ;  xl.  5  ;  Iviii.  14  ;  IxLi.  2  ;  Jer.  ix.  12,  k  xxiii.  16.      Micah  iv.  4. 
I  2  KiDgs  sviii.  25.    Isa.  xxxvi.  10. 


148  CONNEXION  ©P  THE  HISTORY  OP  [PAIIT  J. 

sengers.  But  Necho's  pretence  was  not  so  large  as  Sennache- 
rib's ;  for  Sennacherib  pretended  to  be  sent  by  Jehovah,  the 
certain  name  of  the  true  God,  but  Necho  pretended  to  be 
sent  only  by  Elohim,  which  may  be  interpreted  of  his  false 
Egyptian  gods,  as  well  as  of  the  true  God.  And  it  seems 
clear  he  could  mean  none  other  than  the  former  by  that 
■word  in  this  text ;  and  therefore  Josiah  could  not  be  liable 
to  any  blame,  in  not  hearkening  to  any  words  which  came 
from  them. 

After  the  death  of  Josiah,™  the  people  of  the  land  took 
Jehoahaz,  his  son,  who  was  also  called  Shallum,  and  made 
him  king  in  his  stead.  He  was  much  unlike  his  father,  for 
he  did  that  which  was  evil  in  the  sight  of  the  Lord,  and 
therefore  he  was  soon  tumbled  down  from  his  throne  into  a 
prison,  where  he  ended  his  days  with  misery  and  disgrace  in 
a  strange  land. 

For  Pharaoh-Necho,"  having  had  the  good  success,  in  this 
expedition,  to  beat  the  Babylonians  at  the  Euphrates;  and 
having  thereon  taken  Carchemish,  a  great  city  in  those  parts, 
and  secured  it  to  himself  with  a  good  garrison,  after  three 
months,  returned  again  towards  Egypt,  and  hearing,  in  his 
way,  that  Jehoahaz  had  taken  upon  him  to  be  king  of  Judah, 
without  his  consent,"  he  sent  for  him  to  Riblah  in  Syria,  and 
on  his  arrival,  caused  him  to  be  put  in  chains,  and  sent  him 
prisoner  into  Egypt,  where  he  died  ;  and  then  proceeding  on 
in  his  way,  came  to  Jerusalem,  where  he  made  Jehoiakim,P 
another  of  the  sons  of  Josiah,  king,  instead  of  his  brother, 
and  put  the  land  to  an  annual  tribute  of  an  hundred  talents 
of  silver,  and  a  talent  of  gold  ;i  and  after  that  returned  with 
great  triumph  into  his  own  kingdom. 

Herodotus,  making  mention  of  this  expedition  of  Necho's, 
and  also  of  the  battle  which  he  fought  at  JVlegiddo,  (or  Mag- 
dolum,  as  he  calleth  it,  sailh,""  that  after  the  victory  there  ob- 
tained by  him,  he  look  the  great  city  Cadytis,  which  city  he 
afterward  describes  to  be  a  mountainous  city  in  Palestine,  of 
the  bigness  of  Sardis  in  Lydia,  the  chief  city  of  all  Lesser 
Asia  in  those  times;  by  which  description,  this  city,  Cadytis, 
could  be  none  other  than  Jerusalem  ;  for  that  is  situated  in 
the  mountains  of  Palestine,  and  there  was  then  no  other  city 

m  2  Kings  xxiii.  31.     2  Chron.  xxxvi.  1. 

n  Josephus  Anliq.  lib.  10,  c.  6. 

o  2  Kings  xxiii.  SS.     2  Chron.  xxxvi.  3,  4. 

p  This  Jelioiakim  was  elder  brother  to  Jehoahaz  ;  for  the  latter  was  bnt 
twenty-three  years  old  when  the  otiier  was  twenty-five.  2  Kings  xxiii.  31, 
36,  and  yet  the  people,  on  the  death  of  Josiah,  chose  Jehoahaz  to  succeed 
him. 

q  The  whole  annual  tribute,  as  here  taxed,  came  to  £62.200  sterlina: 

V  Herodotii*.  lib.  22. 


BOOK  I.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  149 

in  those  parts  which  could  be  equalled  to  Sardis  but  that 
only :  and  it  is  certain,  from  Scripture,  that  after  this  battle, 
Necho  did  take  Jerusalem,  for  he  was  there  when  he  made 
Jehoiakim  king.^  There  is,  1  confess,  no  mention  of  this 
name,  either  in  the  Scriptures  or  in  Josephus  5  but  that  it 
was  however  called  so,  in  the  time  of  Herodotus,  by  the 
Syrians  and  Arabians,  doth  appear  from  this,  that  it  is  called 
by  them,  and  all  the  eastern  nations,  by  no  other  name  but 
one  of  the  same  original,  and  the  same  signification,  even  to 
this  day  ;  for  Jerusalem  is  a  name  now  altogether  as  strange 
among  them,  as  Cadytis  is  to  us.  They  all  call  it  by  the 
name  of  Al-kuds,*  which  signifies  the  same  that  Cadytis  doth, 
that  is.  The  Holy  :  for,  from  the  time  that  Solomon  built  the 
temple  at  Jerusalem,  and  it  was  thereby  made  to  all  Israel 
the  common  place  of  their  religious  worship,  this  epithet  of 
The  Holy  was  commonly  given  unto  it;  and  therefore  we 
find  it  thenceforth  called,  in  the  sacred  writings  of  the  Old 
Testament,"  Air  Hakkodesh,  i.  c.  the  City  of  Holiness,  or  the 
Holy  City,  and  so  also,  in  several  places^  in  the  New  Tes- 
tament. And  this  same  title  they  give  it  in  their  coins,  for  the 
inscription  of  their  shekels,  (many  of  which  are  still  extant) 
was  Jerusalem  Kedushah,^  j.  e.  Jerusalem  The  Holy ;  and 
this  coin  going  current  among  the  neighbouring  nations,  espe- 
cially after  the  Babylonish  captivity  had  made  a  dispersion 
of  that  people  over  all  the  East,  it  carried  this  name  with  it 
among  them  ;  and  they  from  hence  called  this  city  both  by 
names  Jerusalem  Kedushah,  and  at  length,  for  shortness  sake, 
Kedushah  only,  and  the  Syrians  (who  in  their  dialect  usually 
turned  the  Hebrew  sh  into  th)  Kedutha.  And  the  Syriac,  in 
the  time  of  Herodotus,  being  the  only  language  that  was 
then  spoken  in  Palestine  (the  Hebrew  having  been  no  more 
used  there,  or  any  where  else,  as  a  \ulgar  language,  after 
the  Babylonish  captivity,)  he  found  it,  when  he  travelled 
through  that  country,  to  be  called  there  in  the  Syriac  dialect 
Kedutha,  (rom  whence,  by  giving  it  a  greek  termination,  he 
made  it,  in  the  Greek  language,  Ktt^vrii,  or  Cadytis,  in  his  his- 
tor},  which  he  wrote  about  the  time  that  Nehemiah  ended 
his  twelve  }ears  government  at  Jerusalem.  And,  for  the 
same  reason  that  it  was  called  Kedushah  or  Kedutha,  in  Syria 
and   Palestine,  the  Arabs,  in    their  language,  called  it  ^Bait 

s  2  Chron,  xsxvi.  3. 

t  Golii  iNotse  ad  Alfraganum,  p.  137.  Sandy's  Travels,  b.  3,  p.  155.  Bau- 
drandi  Gcographia,  sub  voce  Hierosolyma. 

u  Neh.  xi.  1  ii  18.     Isa.  xlviii.2,  &  lii.  1.     Dan.  ix.  24. 

X  Matt.  iv.  5,  &  xxvii.  53.     Rev.  xxi.  2. 

y  See  Lightfoot  s  Works,  vol.  i.  p.  497,  and  vol.  ii.  p.  303^  and  Walton's 
Apparatus  before  the  Polyglot  Bible,  p.  36,  37. 

z  Golii  Notae  ad  Alfraganum,  p.  137.  • 


150  CONNEXION    OF    THE     HISTORY    OF  [PART  I. 

Almokdes,  /.  e.  the  Holy  Buildings,  or  the  Floly  Gity,  and 
often,  with  another  adjective  of  the  same  root,  and  the  same 
sij^nification,  Bait  Alkuds.  and  at  length  simply  Alkuds,  i.  e. 
the  Holy,  by  which  name  only  it  is  now  called  by  the  Turks, 
Arabs,  and  all  other  nations  of  the  Mahometan  religion  in 
tho?e  parts."  And  that  it  may  not  look  strange  to  prove  an 
ancient  name  by  the  modern  name  which  is  now  given  that 
place,  it  is  necessary  I  acquaint  the  reader,  that  the  Arabs 
being  the  ancientest  nation  in  the  world,  (who  have  never 
been  by  any  conquest  dispossessed,  or  drivenout  of  theircoun- 
try,  but  have  there  always  remained  in  a  continued  descent 
from  ihc  lirst  planters  of  it  even  to  this  day.)  and  bemg  also 
as  little  given  to  make  charjges  in  their  manners  and  usages, 
as  they  are  as  to  their  country,  they  have  still  retained  those 
names  of  places  which  were  at  tirst  given  them,  and  on  their 
getting  the  empire  of  the  East,  restored  them  again  to  many 
of  them,  after  they  had  been  for  several  ages  extinct,  by  the 
intermediate  changes  that  had  happened  in  them.  And  thus^ 
the  ancient  metropolis  of  Egypt,  which,  from  Mizraim,  the 
son  of  Ham,  the  tirst  planter  of  that  country  after  the  tlood, 
was  called  Mesri,  and  afterward  for  many  ages  had  the  name 
of  Memphis,  was,  on  the  Arabs  making  themselves  masters  of 
Egypt  again,  called  Mesri,  and  hath  retained  that  name  ever 
since,  though,  by  the  building  of  Cairo  on  the  other  side  of 
the  Nile  over  against  it  (for  Mesri  stands  on  the  west  side  of 
that  river,)  that  ancient  and  once  noble  city  is  now  brought 
in  a  manner  to  desolation.  And  for  the  same  reason  the  city 
of  Tyrus,  which  was  anciently  called  Zor  or  Zur,*^  (from 
whence  the  whole  country  of  Syria  had  its  name,)  hath,  since 
it  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Arabs,  on  the  erecting  of  the  em- 
pire in  the  East,  been  again  called  Sor,*^  and  is  at  this  day 
known  by  no  other  name  in  those  parts.  And  by  the  same 
means  the  city  of  Palmyra  hath  again  recovered  the  old  name 
of  Tadmor,  by  which  it  was  called  in  the  time  of  Solomon,® 
and  is  now  known  in  the  East  by  no  other  name:  and  abun- 
dance of  other  like  instances  might  be  given  in  the  East  to 
this  purpose,  and  the  like  may  be  found  nearer  home.  For 
it  is  well  known  that  the  Welsh,  in  their  language,  do  still 
call  all  the  cities  in  England  by  the  old  British  names,  by 
which  they  were  called  thirteen  hundred  years  ago,  before 

a  Sandys  Travels,  b.3,  p.  155.    Baudrandi  Geog.  sub  voce  Hierosolyma. 

b  Bocbarti  Phaleg.  part  1,  lib.  4,  c.  24.  Gobi  Notae  ad  Alfraganum,  p. 
152,  153,  vSic. 

c  So  it  is  called  in  tbe  original  Hebrew  text  of  the  Old  Testament,  where- 
ver there  is  mention  of  this  city  therein. 

d  Gobi  Notaj  ad  Alfraganum,  p.  130,  131.  Baudrandi  Geog.  sub  voce 
Tyrus.     Thevenot's  Travels,  b.  2,  c.  60,  p.  220. 

•  1  Kings  is.  18,     2  Cbron.  viii.  4. 


JJOOK  I.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  151 

the  Saxons  dispossessed  them  of  this  country;  and  should  they 
recover  it  again,  and  here  get  the  dominion  over  it  as  formerly^ 
no  doubt  they  w(juld  again  restore  to  all  places  here  the  same 
British  names,  by  which  they  still  call  them. 

Jehoiakim,  on  his  taking  on  him  the  kingdom,  followed  the 
example  of  his  broiher  in  doing  that  which  was  evil  / 
for  he  went  on  in  his  steps  to  relax  all  the  good  orderj^";iak^i. 
and  discipline  of  his  father,  as  the  other  had  done,  and 
the  people  (who  never  went  heartily  into  that  good  king's 
reformation,)  gladly  laying  hold  hereof,  did  let  themselves 
loose  to  the  full  bent  of  their  own  depraved  inclinations,  and 
run  into  all  manner  of  iniquit)  ;  whereon  the  prophet  Jere- 
miah, being  sent  of  Cod,^  lirst  went  into  the  king's  house,  and 
there  proclaimed  God's  Judgments  against  him  and  his  family, 
if  he  went  on  in  his  iniquities,  and  did  not  amend  and  repent 
of  them  ;  and  after  that  he  went  up  into  the  temple,''  and 
there  spoke  to. all  the  people  that  came  up  thither  to  worship 
after  the  same  manner,  declaring  unto  them,  that  if  they 
would  turn  from  their  evil  ways,  God  would  turn  from  his 
wrath,  and  repent  of  the  evil  which  he  purposed  to  l)ring 
upon  them;  but  that,  if  they  would  no!  Ijcaiken  u;iti>  him 
to  walk  in  the  law  of  God,  and  kt  ep  his  commandments,  then 
the  wrath  of  God  should  be  poured  out  upon  them,  and  both 
that  city  and  the  temple  should  be  brought  to  utter  desola- 
tion :  which  angering  the  priests  that  then  attended  in  the 
temple,  they  laid  hold  of  hitn,  and  brought  him  before  the 
king's  council  to  have  him  put  to  death.  But  Ahikam,  one 
of  the  chief  lords  of  the  council,  so  befriended  Jeremiah, 
that  he  brought  him  off,  and  got  him  discharged  by  the  general 
suffrage,  not  only  of  the  princes,  but  also  of  all  the  elders  of 
the  people  that  were  then  present.  This  Ahikam  was'  the 
father  of  Gedaliah,  that  was  afterward  made  governor  of  the 
land  under  the  Chaldeans,  and  the  son  of  Shaphan  the  scribe 
(who  was  chief  minister  of  state  under  king  Josiah'^)  and 
brother'  to  Gemariah,  Elasah,™  and  Jazaniah,"  who  were 
great  men  in  those  days,  and  members  also  of  the  council 
with  him;  and  therefore,  in  conjunction  with  them,  he  had 
a  great  interest  there,  which  he  made  use  of  on  this  occa- 
sion to  deliver  the  prophet  from  that  mischief  which  was  in- 
tended against  him. 

But  Uriah,'   another  prophet  of  the  Lord,  who  had  this 
same  year  prophesied  after  the  same  manner,  could  not  so 

f  2  Kings  xxiii.  37.     2  Cliron.  xxsvi.  5. 

g  Jer.  xxii.  h  Jer.  xxvi.  i  2  Kings  xxv.  22. 

k2King?xxii.  1  Jer.  xxxvi.  10.  ni  Jer.  xxix.  3. 

n  Ezek.  viii.  11.     From  vvliich  place  it  is  inferred,  that  Jazaniali  was  tlisi'' 
resident  of  the  ?anhedrin.  o  .lev.  xxvi.  20 — 23. 


152  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OP  [I'ART  /» 

come  off.  For  Jehoiakim  was  so  incensed  against  him  for  it, 
that  he  sought  to  put  him  to  death  ;  whereon  Uriah  fled  into 
Egypt.  But  this  did  not  secure  him  from  his  revenge  ;  for  he 
sent  into  Egypt  after  him,  and.  having  procured  him  to  be 
there  seized,  brought  him  up  from  thence,  ai.d  slew  him 
at  Jerusalem  ;  which  became  a  further  enhancing  of  his  ini- 
quity, and  also  of  God's  wrath  against  him  for  it. 

About  the  same  lime  also  prophesied  the  prophet  Habak- 
kuk,  and  Zephaniah,  who  being  called  to  the  prophetic  office 
in  the  reign  of  .losiah,  continued  (as  seems  most  likely)  to 
this  time  ;  for  they  prophesied  the  same  things  that  Jere- 
miah did,  and  upon  the  same  occasion, i'  that  is,  destruc- 
tion and  desolation  upon  Judah  and  Jerusalem,  because 
of  the  many  heinous  sins  they  were  then  guilty  of.  Ze- 
phaniah doth  not  name  the  Chaldeans,  who  were  to  be 
the  executioners  of  this  wrath  of  God  upon  them,  but  Ha- 
bakkuk  doth.^i  As  to  Habakkuk,  neither  the  time  in  which 
he  lived,  nor  the  parents  from  whom  he  was  descended,  are 
any  where  named  in  Scripture  ;  but  he  prophesying  the 
coming  of  the  Chaldeans  in  the  same  manner  as  Jeremiali 
did,  this  gives  reason  to  conjecture  that  he  lived  in  the  same 
time.  Of  Zephaniah  it  is  directly  said,""  that  he  prophesied 
in  the  time  of  Josiah,  and  in  his  pedigree  (which  is  also 
given  us)  his  father's  grandfather  is  called  Hezekiah/  which, 
some  taking  to  be  king  Hezekiah,  do  therefore  reckon  this 
prophet  to  have  been  of  royal  descent. 

In  the  third  year  of  Jehoiakim,  ^Nabopolassar,  king  of 
Babylon,  finding  that,  on  Necho's  taking  of  Carche- 
jehoiakl's.  ttiish,  all  Syria  and  Palestine  had  revolted  to  him,  and 
that  he  being  old  and  intirni,  was  unable  to  march 
thither  himself  to  reduce  them;  he  took  Nebuchadnezzar  his 
son  into  partnership  with  him  in  the  empire,  and  *sent  him 
with  an  army  into  those  parts  ;  and  from  hence  the  Jewish 
computation  of  the  years  of  Nebuchadnezzar's  reign  be- 
gins, that  is,  from  the  end  of  the  third  year  of  Jehoia- 
kim: for  it  was  about  the  end  of  that  year  that  this  was 
done;  and  therefore,  according  to  the  Jews,"  the  fourth  year 
of  Jehoiakim  was  the  first  year  of  Nebuchadnezzar ;  but,  ac- 
cording to  the  Babylonians,  his  reign  is  not  reckoned  to  begin 
till  after  his  father's  death,  which  happened  two  years  after- 
ward; and  both  computations  being  found  in  Scripture,  it  is 
necessary  to  say  so  much  here  for  the  reconciling  of  them. 

p  Hab.  i.  1—11.     Zeph.  i.  1—18.       q  Hab.  i.  5.        r  Zeph.  i.  1. 
s  Berosus  apud  Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  11,  et  contra  Apion,  lib.  1. 
t  Daniel  i.  1. 

a  Jer.  xxv.  1.  Which  same  fourth  year  was  the  twenty-third  from  the 
thirteenth  of  Josiah,  when  Jeremiah  first  began  to  prophesy,  rer.  3 


SeCMi  1.3  THE  ©LD  AND  NEV,"  TEST AiSENTS.  15Q 

In  the  fourth  year  of  Jehoiakim,  Nebuchadnezzar^  having 
beaten  the  arn^y  of  Necho  king  of  Egypt  at  the  Eu- 
phrates, and  retaken  Carchennish,  marched  towards  j^JJoiak.' 4. 
Syria  and  Palestine,  to  recover  those  provinces  again 
to  the  Babylonish  empire  ;  on  whose  approach  ^  the  Rechab- 
ites,  who,  according  to  the  institution  of  Jonadab,  the  son  of 
Rechab,  their  father,  had  always  abstained  from  wine,  and 
hitherto  only  lived  in  tents,  finding  no  security  from  this  in- 
vasion in  the  open  country,  retiredfortheirsafety  to  Jerusalem, 
where  was  transacted  between  them  and  Jeremiah  what  we 
tind  related  in  the  thirty-fifth  chapter  of  his  propheciesc 

This  very  same  year'-  Jeremiah  prophesied  of  the  coming 
of  Nebuchadnezzar  against  Judah  and  Jerusalem,  that  the 
whole  land  should  be  delivered  into  his  hands,  ^nd  that  a  cap- 
tivity of  seventy  years  continuance  should  after  that  ensue 
upon  the  people  of  the  Jews;  and  he  also  delivered  several 
other  prophecies  of  the  many  calamities  and  woful  desola- 
tions, that  were  then  ready  to  be  brought  up6n  them,  intend- 
ing thereby,  if  possible,  to  bring  them  to  repentance,  that  so 
the  wrath  of  God  might  be  diverted  from  them. 

But  all  this  working  nothing  upon  their  hardened  and  ob- 
durate hearts,  God  commanded  him"   to   collect  together, 
and  write  in  a  roll,  all  the  words  of  prophecy  which  had  beea 
spoken  by  him  against  Israel,  Judah,  and  the  nations,  from  the 
thirteenth  year  of  Josiah  (when  he  was  first  called  to  the  pro- 
phetic office)  to  that  time  ;  whereon  Jeremiah  called  to  him 
Baruch,  the  son  of  Neriah,  a  chief  disciple  of  his,  who,  being 
a  ready  scribe,  wrote  from  his  mouth  all  as  God  had  com- 
manded, and  then  went  with  the  roll,   which  he   had  thus 
written,  up  into  the  temple,  and  there  read  it,  in  the  hearing 
of  all  the  people,  on  the  great  fast  of  the  expiation,  when  all 
Judah  and  Jerusalem  were  assembled  together  at  that  solem- 
nity ;  for  Jeremiah,  being  then  shut  up  in  prison  for  his  former 
prophesying,  could  not  go  up  thither  himself,  and  therefore,  by 
God's  command,  Baruch  was  sent  to  do  it  in  his  stead  ;  and 
at  his  first  reading  of  the  roll,  whether  it  were  that  Jehoiakim 
and  his  princes  were  then  absent  to  take  care  of  the  borders 
of  the  kingdom,  which  Nebuchadnezzar  was  then  just  ready 
to  invade,  or  that,  amidst  the  distractions  which  usually  hap- 
pen on  such  impending  dangers,  men's  minds  were  otherwise 
engaged,  no  resentments  were  at  that  time  expressed  either 
against  the  prophet  or  his  disciple  on  this  occasion.     But  Ba- 
ruch being  much  affrighted  and  dismayed  at  the  threats  of  the 
roll  which  he  had  thus  wrote  and  publicly  read,  the  word  of 
prophecy,  which  we  have  in  the  forty-fifth  chapter  of  Jere* 

X  Jer.  xlvi.  1.  y  Jef.  xxxv.6— 11 

z  Jer.  XXV.  aJer.  xxyi'i 

Vol*  h  'iO 


154  CONNEXION   OP  THE  HISTORY   OF  [PART  T. 

miah,  was  sent  from  God  on  purpose  to  comfort  him,  and  a 
promise  is  therein  given  him,  that  amidst  all  the  calamities, 
destructions,  and  desolations,  which,  according  to  the  words 
of  the  roll,  should  be  certainly  brought  upon  Judah  and  Jeru- 
salem, he  should  be  sure  to  find  a  deliverance  ;  for  that  none  of 
them  should  reach  him,  but  God  would  give  him  his  life  for  a 
prey,  in  all  places  wheresoever  he  should  go. 

The  great  fast  of  the  expiation,  wherein  Baruch  read  the 
roll,  as  is  above  related,  was  annuallj  kept  by  the  Jews*'  on  the 
tenth  day  of  the  month  Tizri,  which  answers  to  our  Septem- 
ber. Immediately  after  that  Nebuchadnezzar  invaded  Judea  ; 
and,  having  laid  siege  to  Jerusalem,"^  made  himself  master  of 
it  in  the  ninth  month,  called  Cisleu,  which  answers  to  our 
November,  on^he  eighteenth  day  of  that  month,  (for  on  that 
day  is  still  kept  by  the  Jews  an  annual  fast  in  commemoration 
of  it  even  to  this  day.)  and,  having  then  taken  Jehoiakim  pri- 
soner, he  put  him  in  chains,  to  carry  him  to  Babylon.  But 
behaving''  humbled  himself  to  Nebuchadnezzar,  and  submit- 
ted to  become  his  tributary,  and  thereon  sworn  fealty  to  him, 
he  was  again  restored  to  his  kingdom  ;  and  Nebuchadnezzar 
marched  from  Jerusalem  for  the  farther  prosecuting  of  his 
victories  against  the  Egyptians. 

But,  before  he  removed  from  Jerusalem,  he  had  caused 
great  numbers  of  the  people  to  be  sent  captive  to  Babylon, 
and  particularly®  gave  order  to  Ashpenaz,  the  master  of  his 
eunuchs,  that  he  should  make  choice  out  of  the  children 
of  the  royal  family,  and  of  the  nobility  of  the  land,  such  as 
he  found  to  be  of  the  fairest  countenance,  and  the  quickest 
parts,  to  be  carried  to  Babylon  and  there  made  eunuchs  in 
his  palace ;  whereby  was  fulfilled  the  word  of  the  Lord 
spoken  by  ^  Isaiah  the  prophet  to  Hezekiah,  king  of  Judah, 
above  an  hundred  years  before.  At  the  same  time  also, 
he^  carried  away  a  great  part  of  the  vessels  of  the  house  of 
the  Lord  to  put  them  in  the  house  of  Bel,  his  god,  at  Baby- 
lon. And  therefore,  the  people  being  thus  carried  into  cap- 
tivity, the  sons  of  the  royal  family,  and  of  the  nobility  of  the 
land,  made  eunuchs  and  slaves  in  the  palace  of  the  king  of 
Babylon,  the  vessels  of  the  temple  carried  thither,  and  the 
king  made  a  tributary,  and  the  whole  land  now  brought 
into  vassalage  under  the  Babylonians,  from  hence  must  be 
reckoned  the  beginning  of  the  seventy  years  of  the  Baby- 
lonish captivity,  foretold  by  the  prophet  Jeremiah  -^  and  the 

b  Lev.  xvi.  29 ;  &.  xxiii.  27.  c  Dan.  i.  2.    2  Chron-  ssxvi.  6. 

d  2  Kings  xxiv.  1.  e  Dan.  i.  3. 

f  Isa.  xxxix.  7.  2  Kings  xx.  18.  ^Dan.  i.  2. 
h  Jer.  xsv.  11 :  &  xxix.  10. 


3J00K  I.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW   TESTAMENTS.  155 

fourth  year  of  Jehoiakim  must  be  the  first  year  in  that  com- 
putation. 

Among  the    number  of  the  children,  that  were   carried 
away  in  this  captivity  by  the  masterof  the  eunuchs,  were  Da- 
niel, Hananiah,  Mishael,  and  Azariah.'     Daniel  they  called 
Belteshazzar,  and  the  other  three,  Shadrach,  Meshach,  and 
Abednego.     Some,  indeed,    do  place  their  captivity  some 
years  later,  but  that  is  absolutely  inconsistent  with  what  is 
elsewhere  said  in  Scripture.     For  these  children,  after  their 
carrying  away  to  Babylon,  were  to  be''-  three  years  under  the 
tuition  of  the  masterof  the  eunuchs,  to  be  instructed  by  him 
in  the  language  and   the  learning  of  the  Chaldeans,   before 
they  were  to  be  admitted  to  the   presence  of  the  king,  to 
stand  and  serve  before  him.     But  in  the  second'  year  of  Ne- 
buchadnezzar's reign  at  Babylon,  from  his  father's  death  (which 
was   but  the  fourth  year  after  his  first  taking  of  Jerusalem,) 
Daniel  had  not  only  admission  and  freedom  of  access  to  the 
presence  of  the  king,  but  we  find  him™  there  interpreting  of 
his  dream,  and  immediately  thereon  advanced  to  be  chief" 
of  the  governors  of  the   wise  men,   and   ruler  over  all  the 
province  of  Babylon  :  for  which  trust   less  than  four  years 
instruction  in  the  language,  laws,  usages,  and  learning  of  the 
country  can  scarce  be  thought  sufficient  to  qualify  him,  nor 
could  he  any  sooner  be  old  enough  for  it ;  for  he  was  but  a 
youth  when  he  was  first  carried  away  from  Jerusalem.     And 
therefore  all  this  put  together  doth  necessarily    determine 
the  time  of  Daniel's  and  the  other  children's  carrying  away 
to  Babylon  to  the  year  where  I  have  placed  it  ;  and,   if  we 
will  make  Scripture  consistent  with  Scripture,  it  could  not 
possibly  have  been  any  later.     Daniel,  speaking  of  the  cap- 
tivity," begins  the  history  of  it  from  the  third  year  of  Jehoi- 
akim, which  placeth  it  back  still  a  year  farther  than  I  have 
done :  and  this  is  an  objection  on  the  other   hand  ;  but  the 
answer  hereto  is  easy.     Daniel  begins  his  computation  from 
the  time  that  Nebuchadnezzar  was  sent  from  Babylon  by  his 
father  on   this   expedition,   which  was  in  the  latter  end  of 
the  third  year  of  Jehoiakim  :  after  that,  two  months  at  least 
must  have  been  spent  in  his  march  to  the  borders  of  Syria. 
There  in  the  fourth  year  of  Jehoiakim  (we  suppose  in  the 
beginning  of  that  year)  he  fought  the  Egyptians;  and  hav- 
ing overthrown  them  in  battle,  besieged  Carchemish,  and 
took  it  :  after  this,  he  reduced  all  the  provinces  and  cities  of 
Syria  and  Phoenicia,  in  which  having  employed  the  greatest 
part  of  the  year  (and  a  great  deal  of  work  it  was  to  do  with- 
in that  time,)  in  the  beginning  of  October,  he  came  and  laid 

i  Dan.  i.  6.  k  Dan.  i.  5.  1  Dan.  il.  16. 

raDan.  ii.  31.  a  Dan.  ii,  48.  ©Dani-I'. 


156  CONNEXION  OF  THE  FISTORY  OF  [PART  i. 

siege  to  Jerusalem,  and,  about  a  month  after,  took  the  city  : 
and  from  hence  we  date  the  beginning  of  Daniel's  servitude, 
and  also  the  beginning  of  the  seventy  years  of  the  Babylonisli. 
captivity  ;  and  therefore  do  reckon  lliat  year  to  have  been  the 
first  of  both. 

The  Scythians,  who  had  now  for  twenty-eight  years  held 
all  the  Upper  Asia  (that  is,  tl>e  two  Armenias,  Cappadocia, 
Pontus,  Colchis,  and  Iberia,)  were  this  year  again^  driven  out 
of  it.  I  he  Mi^des,  whom  they  had  dispossessed  of  these 
provinces,  had  ioiig  endeavoured  to  recover  thtm  by  open 
force  ;  but  finding  themselves  unable  to  succeed  this  way, 
they  at  length  accomplished  it  by  treachery  :  for,  under  the 
covert  of  a  peace  (^which  they  had  made  on  purpose  to  carry 
on  the  fraud,)  they  mvited  the  greatest  part  of  them  to  a 
feast,  where,  having  made  them  drunk,  they  slew  them  all  '^ 
after  which,  having  easily  subdued  the  rest,  thtty  recovered 
from  them  all  that  they  had  lost, 'and  again  extended  their 
empire  to  the  river  Halys,  which  had  been  the  ancient  borders 
of  it  towards  the  west. 

Afterthe  Chaldeans  were  gone  from  Jerusalem,  Jehoiakira^ 
instead  of  being  amended  by  those  heavy  chastise- 
Jeboiaif.'5.  "^cnts  which  by  their  hand  God  had  inflicted  on  him 
and  his  kingdom,  rather  grew  worse  under  ihem  in  all. 
those  ways  of  wickedness  and  impiety  which  he  had  afore 
practised  ;  and  Judah  and  Jerusalem  kept  pace  with  him  here- 
in,to  the  fartherprovokingof  God's  wrath, and  the  hastening  of 
their  own  destruction.     However,  no  means  were  omitted  to 
reclaim  them  ;  and  Jeremiah  the  prophet,  who  was  particular- 
ly sent  to  them  for  this  purpose,  was  constantly  calling  upon 
them,  and  exhorting  them  to  turn  unto  the  Lord  their  God, 
that  so  his  wrath  might  be  turned  from  them,  and  the)  saved 
from  the  destruction  which  was  coming  upon  them,  of  which 
he  ceased  not  continually  to  warn  them.     And  they  having, 
on  the  ninth  month,  called  Cisleu,  proclaimed  a  public  fast 
to  be  held  on  the  eighteenth  day  of  the  same,  because  of  the 
calamity  which  they  had  suiFered  thereon,  in  the   takio"  of 
Jerusalem  by  the  Chaldeans  the  year  foregoing  (which  hath 
ever  since  been  annually  observed  by  them  in  commemora- 
tion hereof,  as  hath  been  afore  said,  the  prophet,  laying  hold 
of  this  opportunity,  when  all  Judaii  and  Jerusalem   were 
met  together  to  keep  this  solernntiy,i  sent  Baruch  again  up 
into  the  temple  with  the  roll  of  his  prophecies,  there  to  read 
it  a  second  tmie  in  the  hearing  of  all  of  them,  making  there- 
by another  trial,  if  by   the  terrors   of  these   prophecies,  it 
jf'ere  possible  to  fright  them  into  their  duty.     And  ri  being' 

^   I'lyodotiis  lib.  1.  q  .lev.  sx.)ivi,  «>,  10,  Jcq. 


BOOK  I.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  157 

God's  command,  by  the  mouth  of  his  prophet,  Baruch  ac-^ 
cordinglj  went  up  into  the  temple  on  the  said  fast-day,  and, 
entering  into  the  chamber  of  Gemariah  the  scribe  (which 
was  the  room  where  the  king's  council  used  to  sit  in  the  tem- 
ple, near  the  east  gate  of  the  same,)  did  ihere,  from  a  window 
aloft,  read,  in  the  hearing  of  all  the  people,  then  gath-Tcd 
together  in  the  court  below,  ail  the  words  of  the  said  roll : 
whicii  Micaiah,  th  •  son  of  Geinariah,  who  was  then  present, 
hearing,  went  imiviediatel)  to  the  king's  house,  and  there  in- 
fornied  the  lords  of  the  council  of  it ;  whereon  they  sent 
for  Baruch,  and  caused  him  to  sit  down,  and  read  the  roll 
over  to  them  ;  at  the  hearing  whereof,  and  the  threats  therein 
contained,  they  being  much  atlVightcd,  inquired  of  Baruch 
the  manner  of  his  writing  of  it  ;  and  being  informed  that  it 
was  all  dictated  to  him  from  the  mouth  of  the  prophet,  they 
ordered  him  to  leave  the  roll  and  depart,  advising,  that  he 
and  Jeremiah  should  immediately  go  and  hide  themselves, 
where  no  one  might  find  them  ;  and  then  went  in  to  the  king, 
and  informed  him  of  all  that  had  passed  ;  whereon  he  sent  for 
the  roll,  and  caused  it  to  be  read  to  him  ;  but  after  he  had 
heard  three  or  four  leaves  of  it,  as  he  was  sitting  by  the  fire  in 
the  winter  parlour,  he  took  it  and  cut  it  with  a  penknife,  and 
cast  it  into  the  (ire  that  was  there  before  him,  till  it  was  all 
consumed,  notwithstanding  some  of  the  lords  of  the  council 
entreated  him  to  the  contrary;  and  immediately  thereon, 
issued  out  an  order  to  have  Baruch  and  Jeremiah  seized  ; 
but  having  hid  themselves,  as  advised  by  the  council,  they 
could  not  be  found. 

The  Jews  keep  an  annual  fast  even  to  this  day  for  the 
burning  of  this  roll  :  the  day  marked  for  it  in  their  callendar 
is  the  twenty-ninth  day  o(  Cisleu,''  eleven  days  after  that 
which  they  keep  for  that  fast  on  which  it  was  read  in  the 
temple.  But  the  reading  of  the  roll  on  the  fast  of  the  eigh- 
teenth of  Cisleu,  and  the  burning  of  it  according  to  the  ac- 
count  given  hereof  by  Jeremiah,  seem  immediately  to  have 
followed  each  other. 

After  the  burning  of  this  roll,  another,  by  God's  especial 
command,  was  forthwith  written  in  the  same  manner,  from 
the  mouth  of  the  prophet,  by  tiie  hand  of  Baruch.  wherein 
was  contained  all  that  was  in  the  former  roll ;  and  there  were 
added  many  other  like  words,  and  particularly  that  prophecy 
in  respect  of  Jehoiakim  and  his  house,  which  is,  for  this  im- 
pious fact,  in  the  thirtieth  and  thirty  first  verses  of  the  thirty- 
sixth  chapter ot  Jeremiah,  denounced  against  them. 

in  making  the  roll  to  be  read  twice  in  the  temple  by  Baruch^,. 

r  Cisleu  is  ttie  ninth  month  in  the  Jewish  year,  and  answer*  to  ctlr 
November, 


158  CONNEXION  OF   THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

I  confess,  I  differ  from  most  that  have  commented  upon  this 
place  01  Scripture.  Bui  as  the  reading  of  the  roll  by  Baruch 
is,  in  the  thirty-sixth  cliapterof  Jeremiah,  twice  related,  so  it 
is  plain  to  me,  that  it  was  twice  done  :  for  in  the  first  relation 
it  is  said  to  be  done  in  the  fourth  }ear  of  Jehoiakim,^  and, 
in  the  second,  it  is  said  to  be  done  in  the  fifth  ;*  which  plain- 
ly denotes  two  different  times.  And,  in  the  first  relation, 
Jeremiah"  is  said  to  be  shut  up  in  prison,  when  the  roll  was 
read  ;  but  in  the  second  relation,  it  plainly  appears,  he  was 
out  of  prison,  for  he  was  then  at  full  liberty  to  go  out  of 
the  way  and  hide  himself.*  For  these  reasons  I  take  it 
for  certain,  that  the  roll  was  twice  read  :  and  I  have  arch- 
bishop Usher  with  me  in  the  same  opinion,  whose  judg- 
ment must  always  be  of  the  greatest  weight  in  such  mat- 
ters. 

Nebuchadnezzar,  after  his  departure  from  Jerusalem, 
employed  all  this  year  in  carrying  on  his  war  against  the 
Egyptians,  in  which  he  had  that  success,  that  before  the 
ensuing  winter,  he  had  driven  them  out  of  all  Syria  and 
Palestine,  and  brought  ii>  subjection  to  him.^  from  the  river 
Euphrates  to  the  river  of  Egypt,  all  that  formerly  belonged 
to  the  king  of  Egypt,  i.  e.  all  Syria  and  Palestine.  For, 
as  the  river  Euphrates  was  the  boundary  of  Syria  towards 
the  northeast ;  so  the  river  of  Egypt  was  the  boundary  of 
Palestine  towards  the  southwest.  This  river  of  Egypt,  which 
is  so  often  mentioned  in  Scripture  as  the  boundary  of  the  land 
of  Canaan,  or  Palestine,  towards  Egypt,  was  not  the  Nile,  as 
many  suppose,  but  a  small  river,  which,  running  through  the 
desert  that  lies  between  these  two  countries,  was  anciently 
reckoned  the  common  boundary  of  both.  And  thus  far  the 
land  reached,  which  was  promised  to  the  seed  of  Abraham 
(Gen.  XV.  18.)  and  was  afterward  by  lot  divided  among 
them,  (Josh.  xv.  4.) 

Towards  the  end  of  the  fifth  year  of  Jehoiakim,  died  Na- 
bopolassar,  king  of  Babylon,  and  father  of  Nebuchadnezzar, 
after  he  had  reigned  one  and  twenty  years, ^  which  Nebuchad- 
nezzar being  informed  of,  ■*  he  immediately,  with  a  few  only 
of  his  followers,  hastened  through  the  desert  the  nearest 
way  to  Babylon,  leaving  the  gross  of  his  army,  with  the  pri- 
soners and  prey,  to  be  brought  after  him  by  his  generals. 
On  his  arrival  at  the  palace,  he  received  the  govern- 
jehoiak'ei'^ent  from  the  hands  of  those  who  had  carefully  re- 
served it  for  him.  and  thereon  succeeded  his  father 
in  the  whole    empire,  which    contained  Chaldea,  Assyria, 

s  Jer.  xxxvi.  1.  t  Jer.  xxxvi.  9.  u  Jer.  xxxvi.  5. 

X  Jer.  xxxvi.  26.  y  2  Kings  xxiv.  7.  z  Canon  Ptoimaei. 

a  Berosus  apud  Joseph,  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  1),  et  contra  Apionein,  lib.  1. 


BOOK  I.]       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  159 

Arabia,  Syria,  and  Palestine,  and  reigned  over  it,  accord- 
ing to  Ptolemy,  forty-three  years  ;  the  first  of  which  begins 
fronn  the  January  following,  which  is  the  Babylonish  ac- 
count, from  which  the  Jewish  account  ditfers  two  years, 
as  reckoning'  his  reign  from  the  time  he  was  admitted  to 
be  partner  with  his  father.  From  hence  we  have  a  double 
computation  of  the  years  of  his  reign,  the  Jewish  and  the 
Babylonish  ;  Daniel  follows  the  latter,  but  all  other  parts  of 
Scripture  that  make  mention  of  him  the  other. 

Inthe  seventhyearofJehoiakim,  which  was  the  second  year 
of  Nebuchadnezzar,  according  to  the  Babylonish  ac- 
count, and  the  fourth  according  to  the  Jewish,  Daniel  j^,Joia^°7; 
revealed  unto  Nebuchadnezzar  his  dream.*'  and  also 
unfolded  to  him  the  interpretation  of  it,  in  the  manner  as 
we  have  it  at  large  related  in  the  second  chapter  of  Daniel  ; 
whereon  he  was  advanced  to  great  honour,  being  made  chief 
of  the  governors  over  all  the  wise  men  of  Babylon,  and 
also  chief  ruler  over  the  whole  province  of  Babylon,  and  one 
of  the  chief  lords  of  the  council,  who  always  continued  in 
the  king's  court,  he  being  then  about  (he  age  of  twenty-two. 
And,  in  his  prosperity,  he  was  not  forgetful  of  his  three  com- 
panions, who  had  been  brought  to  Bab}  Ion  with  him,  Shad- 
rach,  Meshach,  and  Abednego;  but  having  spoken  to  the 
king  in  their  behalf,  procured  that  they  were  preferred  to 
places  of  great  honour  under  him  in  the  province  of  Baby- 
lon. These  afterward  made  themselves  very  signally  known 
to  the  king,  and  also  to  the  whole  empire  of  Babylon, 
by  their  constancy  to  their  religion,  in  refusing  to  worship 
the  golden  image  which  Nebuchadnezzar  had  set  up,  and  by 
the  wonderful  deliverance  which  God  wrought  for  them 
thereon  ;  which  deservedly  recommending  them  to  the  king's 
highest  regard,  they  were  thereon  much  higher  advanced  : 
the  whole  history  whereof  is  at  full  related  in  the  third  chap- 
ter of  Daniel. 

The  same  year,  Jehoiakim,  after  he  had  served  the  king  of 
Babylon  three  years,*^  rebelled  against  him,  and,  refusing  to 
pay  him  any  more  tribute,  renewed  his"  confederacy  with 
Pharaoh  Necho,  kingof  Kgypt,  in  opposition  to  him.  Where- 
on Nebuchadnezzar,  not  being  then  at  leisure,  by  reason  of 
other  engagements,  to  come  himself  and  chastise  him,  sent 
orders  to  all  his  lieutenants  and  governors  of  provinces  in 
those  parts  to  make  war  upon  him  ;  which  brought  upon  Je- 
hoiakim inroads  and  invasions  from  every  quarter,*^  the  Am- 
monites, the  Moabites,  the  Syrians,  the  Arabians,  and  all  the 
other  nations  round  him,  who  had  subjected  themselves  to  the 
Babylonish  yoke,  infesting  him  with  incursions,  and  harassing 

"h  Daniel  ii.  fc  2  Kings  xxir.  T  d  2  Kings  xxir.  2 


160  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART  t. 

him  with  depredations  on  every  side :  and  thus  they  con- 
tinued to  do  for  three  years  together,  till  at  length,  in  the 
eleventh  year  of  his  reign,  all  parties  joined  together 
jehotak.ii  agai'ist  him  ;  they  shut  him  up  in  Jerusalem,®  where, 
in  the  prosecution  of  the  siege,  having  taken  him  pri- 
soner in  some  sally  (it  may  be  supposed)  which  he  nmde 
upon  them,  they  slew  him  with  the  sword,  and  then  cast  out  his 
dead  body  into  the  high-way,  without  one  of  the  gatts  of 
Jerusalem,  allowing  it  no  other  burial,  '^as  the  prophet  Jere- 
miah had  foretold,  than  that  of  an  ass.  that  is,  to  be  cast  forth 
into  a  place  of  the  greatest  contempt,  there  to  rot  and  be  con- 
sumed to  dust  in  the  open  air. 

The  year  bc;fore,°died  his  confederate,  on  whom  he  chiefly 
depended,  Pharaoh  Necho,  king  of  Egypt,  after  he  had 
reigned  sixteen  years,  and  Psammis  his  son  succeeded  him  in 
the  kingdom, 

Jehoiakim  being  dead,**  Jehoiachin  his  son  (who  is  also 
.  called  Jeconiah,  and  Coriiah)  reigned  in  his  stead, 
Jehoiachin.  who  doiiig  cvil  in  the  sight  of  the  Lord,  in  the  same 
manner  as  his  father  had  done  ;  this  provoked  'a  very 
bitter  declaration  of  God's  wrath  against  him,  by  the  mouth 
of  the  prophet  Jeremiah,  and  it  was  as  bitterly  executed 
upon  him.  For  after  Jehoiakim's  death,  the  servants  of  Ne- 
buchadnezzar (that  is,  his  lieutenants  and  governors  of  the 
provinces,  that  were  undf^r  his  subjection  in  those  parts)  still'' 
continued  to  block  up  Jerusalem  ;  and,  after  three  months, 
Nebuchadnezzar  himself  came  thither  in  person  with  his 
royal  army,  and  caused  the  place  to  be  begirt  with  a  close 
siege  on  every  side;  whereon  Jehoiachin,  finding  himself 
unable  to  defend  it,  went  out  to  Nebuchadnezzar  with  his 
mother,  and  his  princes  and  servants,  and  delivered  himself 
into  his  hands.  But  hereby,  he  obtained  no  other  favour 
than  to  save  his  life,  for,  being  immediately  put  in  chains,  he 
was  carried  to  Babylon,  and  there  continued  shut  up  in  pri- 
son till  the  death  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  which  was  full  seven 
and  thirty  years. 

Nebuchadnezzar,  having  hereon  made  himself  master  of 
Jerusalem,'  took  thence  all  the  treasures  of  the  house  of 
the  Lord,  and  the  treasures  of  the  king's  house,  and  cut 
in  pieces  the  vessels  of  gold,  which  Solomon,  king  of  Israel^ 
had  made  in  the  temple  of  the  Lord,  and  carried  them  to 
Babylon ;  and  he  also  carried  thither  with  him  a  vast  number 

e  2  Kings  xxiv.  10,  f  .Ter.  xxii.  18,  19  ;  &i  xxxvi.  30. 

g  Herod,  lib.  2.  h  2  Kings  xxiv.  6.  2  Chron.  xxxvi.  9. 

i  Jer.  xxii.  24—30.  k  2  Kings  sxiv.  10,  11. 

1  2  Kings  sxiv.  13—16. 


feddK  I.j  THE  0L1>  Ai\l>  tsKW  iCESTAlKEN'I'Ai.  Itii 

of  captives,  Jehoiachin  the  king,  his  mother,  and  his  wives, 
and  his  officers,  and  princes,  and  all  the  mighty  men  of  valour, 
even  to  the  number  of  ten  thousand  men,  out  of  Jerusalem 
only,  besides  the  smiths,  and  the  carpenters,  and  other  arti- 
ficers; and,  out  of  the  rest  of  the  land,  of  the  mighty  men 
seven  thousand,  and  of  the  craftsmen  and  smiths  one  thou- 
sand, besides  three  thousand  twenty  and  three,"'  which  had 
been  carried  away  the  year  before  out  of  the  open  country, 
before  the  siege  of  Jerusalem  was  begun.  With  the  mighty 
men  of  valour  he  recruited  his  army,  and  the  artificers  he 
employed  in  the  carrying  on  of  his  building  at  Babylon  ;  of 
which  we  shall  speak  hereafter. 

In  this  captivity"  was  carried  away  to  Babylon  Ezekiel  the 
prophet,  the  son  of  Buzi,  of  the  house  of  Aaron,  and  there- 
fore the  era  whereby  he  reckons  throughout  all  his  prophe- 
cies is  from  this  captivity. 

After  this  great  carrying  away  of  the  Jews  into"  captivity^ 
the  poorer  sort  of  the  people  being  still  left  in  the  land,  Ne- 
buchadnezzar made  Mattaniah,  the  son  of  Josiah,  and  uncle 
of  Jehoiachin,  king  over  them,  taking  of  him  a  solemn  oath 
to  be  true  and  faithful  unto  him;  and,  to  engage  him  the 
more  to  be  so,  he  changed  his  name  from  Mattaniah  to  Zede- 
kiah,  which  signifieth  the  justice  of  the  Lord,  intending  by  (hie 
name  to  put  him  continually  in  mind  of  the  vengeance  which 
he  was  to  expect  from  the  justice  of  the  Lord  his  God,  if  he 
violated  that  fidelity,  which  he  had  in  his  name  sworn  unto 
him. 

Zedekiah,  being  thus  made  king,  reigned  eleven  years  in 
Jerusalem  ;  but  his  ways  being  evil  in  the  sight  of  the  Lord, 
as  were  those  of  his  nephew  and  brothers  that  reigned  before 
him,  he  did  thereby  so  far  fill  up  the  measure  of  the  iniquities 
of  his  forefathers,  that  they  at  length  drew  down  upon  Judali 
and  Jerusalem  that  terrible  destruction  in  which  his  reigt> 
ended. 

And  thus  was  concluded  the  second  war  which  Nebuchad- 
nezzar had  with  the  Jews.  Three  years  he  managed  it  by 
his  lieutenants  and  governors  of  (he  neighbouring  provinces 
of  his  empire.  In  the  fourth  year  he  came  himself  in  per- 
son, and  put  an  end  to  it  in  the  captivity  of  Jehoiachin,  and 
the  taking  of  Jerusalem.  What  hindered  him  from  coming 
sooner  is  not  said  ;  only  it  appears  that  in  the  tenth  year  of 
Jehoiakim,  he  was  engaged  in  an  arbitration  between  the 
Medes  and  Lydians.  The  occasion  was  this.  After^  the 
Medes  had  recovered  all  the  Upper  Asia  out  of  the  hand  of 

m  Jer.  lii.  2S  n  Ezek.  xl.  1. 

o  2  Kings  xxiv,  17   3  Chroii.  xxxvi.  10.        p  Herodotus,  lib.  2. 
Vol.  I.  21 


i^2  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  i. 

the  Scythians,  and  again  extended  their  borders  to  tire  river 
Halys,  which  was  the  common  boundary  between  them  and 
the  Lydians,  it  was  not  long  before  there  happened  a  war 
between  these  two  nations,  which  was  managed  lor  five  years 
together  with  various  success.  In  the  sixth  year  they  enga- 
ged each  other  with  the  utmost  of  their  strength,  intending 
to  make  that  battle  decisive  of  the  quarrel,  that  was  between 
them.  But,  in  the  midst  of  it,  while  the  fortune  of  the  day- 
seemed  to  hang  in  an  equal  balance  between  them,  there  hap- 
pened an  eclipse,  which  overspread  both  armies  with  dark- 
ness ;  whereon,  being  frightened  with  what  had  happened, 
they  both  desisted  from  fighting  any  longer,  and  agreed  to  re- 
fer the  controversy  to  the  arbitration  of  two  neighbouring 
princes.  The  Lydians  chose  Siennesis  king  of  Cilicia,  and 
the  Medes^  Nebuchadnezzar,  king  of  Babylon,  who  agreed 
a  peace  between  them  on  the  terms,  that  Astyages,  son  to 
Cyaxares,  king  of  Media,  should  take  to  wife  Arienna,  the 
daughter  of  Halyattis,  king  of  the  Lydians ;  of  which  mar- 
riage, within  a  year  after,  was  born  Cyaxares,  who  is  called 
Darius  the  Median  in  the  book  of  Daniel.  This  eclipse  was 
foretold  by  Thales  the  Milesian  ;  and  it  happened  on  the 
twentieth  of  September,  according  to  the  Julian  account,  in 
the  hundred  and  forty-seventh  year  of  Nabonassar,  and  in 
the  ninth  of  the  reign  of  Jehoiakim,  king  of  Judah,  which 
was  the  year  before  Christ  601. 

The  same  year  that  Cyaxares  was  born  to  Astyages,  he 
gave  his  daughter  Mandana,  whom  he  had  by  a  former  wife, 
in  marriage  to  Cambyscs,  king  of  Persia  ;  of  whom  the  next 
year  after  (which  was  the  last  year  of  Jehoiakim,)  was  born 
Cyrus,  the  famous  founder  of  the  Persian  monarchy,  and  the 
restorer  of  the  Jews  to  their  country,  their  temple,  and  their 
former  state. 

Jehoiachin  being  thus  carried  into  captivity,  and  Zedekiah 
settled  in  the  tiirone,  Jeremiah  had,  in  a  vision/  under  the 
type  of  two  baskets  of  figs,  foreshown  unto  him  the  restora- 
tion which  God  would  again  give  to  them  who  were  carried 
into  captivity,  and  the  misery  and  desolation  which  should 
befall  them,  with  their  king,  that  were  still  in  the  land;  that 
the  captivity  of  the  former  should  become  a  means  of  pre- 
servation unto  them,  while  the  liberty  which  the  others 
were  left  in  should  serve  only  to  lead  them  to  their  utter 
ruin  ;  as  accordingly  it  befell  them  in  the  destruction  of  Jeru- 
salem, and  the  utter  devastation  of  the  land,  which  happened 
:a  few  years  afterward. 

The  same  year  God  also  foreshowed  to  Jeremiah  the  con- 

i\  He  Vs  by  Herodoiu^,  lib.  1,  callcii  Labynetiij  r  .ler.  \\\\. 


KOOK  I.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  163 

fusion  which  he  v/ould  bring  upon  ^Elafn,  (a  kingdom  lying 
upon  the  river  Ulai,  eastward  beyond  the  Tigris,)  and  the 
restoration  which  he  would  afterward  give  thereto  ;  which 
accordingly  came  to  pass  :  for  it  was  conquered  by  Nebu- 
chadnezzar,* and  subjected  to  him,  in  the  same  manner  as 
Judah  was.  But  afterward,  joining  with  Cyrus,  it  helped  to 
conquer  and  subdue  the  Babylonians,  who  had  before  con- 
quered them  ;  and  Shushan,"  which  was  the  chief  city  of 
that  province,  was  thenceforth  made  the  metropolis  of  the 
Persian  empire,  and  had  the  throne  of  the  kingdom  placed 
in  it. 

After  the  departure  of  Nebuchadnezzar  out  of  Judea  and 
Syria,  Zedekiah  having  settled  himself  in  the  kingdom,"  the 
kings  of  the  Ammonites,  and  of  the  Moabites,  and  of  the 
Edomites,  and  of  the  Zidonians,  and  of  the  Tyrians,  and  of 
the  other  neighbouring  nations,  sent  their  ambassadors  to  Je- 
rusalem, to  congratulate  Zedekiah  on  his  accession  to  the 
throne,  and  then  proposed  to  !iim  a  league  against  the  king 
of  Babylon,  for  the  shaking  oif  his  yoke,  and  the  hindering 
of  him  from  any  more  returning  into  those  parts.  Whereon 
Jeremiah,  by  the  command  of  God,  made  him  yokes  and 
bonds,  and  sent  them  by  the  said  ambassadors  to  their  re- 
spective masters,  with  this  message  from  God,  That  God  had 
given  all  their  countries  unto  the  king  of  Babylon,  and  that 
they  should  serve  him  and  his  son,  and  his  son's  son,  and  that, 
if  they  would  submit  to  his  yoke,  and  become  obedient  to 
him,  it  should  be  well  with  them,  and  their  land  ;  but,  if 
otherwise,  they  should  be  consumed  and  destroyed  before 
him.  And  he  spake  also  to  king  Zedekiah  according  to  the 
same  words  ;  which  had  that  influence  on  him,  that  he  did 
not  then  enter  into  the  league  that  vv'as  proposed  to  him  by 
the  ambassadors  of  those  princes.  But  afterward,  when  it 
was  farther  strengthened,  by  the  joining  of  the  Egyptians  and 
other  nations  in  it,  and  h6  and  his  people  began  to  be  tired 
with  the  heavy  burden  and  oppression  of  the  Babylonish  do- 
mination over  them,  he  also  was  drawn  into  this  confederacy ; 
which  ended  in  the  absolute  ruin  both  of  him  and  his  king- 
dom, as  will  be  hereafter  related. 

Zedekiah,  about  the  second  year  of  his  reign,>'  sent   Ela- 
sah,  the  son  of  Shaphan,  and  Gemariah,  the  son  of 
Hilkiah,  to   Babylon,  on  an  embassy  to  king  Nebu-    z"'/ek.'2. 
chadnezzar.     By  them  Jeremiah  wrote  a  letter  to  the 
Jews  of  the  captivity  in  Babylon.     The  occasion  of  which 
was,  Ahab  the  son  of  Kilaiah,  and  Zedekiah  the  son  of  Maa- 

s  Jer.  xlis.  34—39.  t  Xen.  Cyclopsed.  lib.  6. 

11  Sn-abo.  lib.  15.  n,  737.        x  Jer.  xxvii.  y  Jer.  xxix. 


1*54  <  O.VNEXION  OF  TJHE  HISTORY  OV  [PART  I. 

seiah,  two  of  the  captivity  among  the  Jews  at  Babylon,  taking 
upon  them  to  be  prophets  sent  to  them  from  God,  fed  them 
with  lying  prophecies,  and  false  promises  of  a  speedy  resto- 
ration, whereon  they  neglected  to  make  any  settlements  in 
the  places  assigned  them  for  their  habitation,  either  by  build- 
ing of  houses,  cultivating  their  land,  marrying  of  wives,  or 
doing  any  thing  else  for  their  own  interest  and  welfare  in  the 
country  where  they  were  carried,  out  of  a  vain  expectation 
of  a  speedy  return.  To  remedy  this  evil,  Jeremiah  wrote 
to  them  to  let  them  know,  that  they  were  deceived  by  those 
who  made  them  entertain  such  false  hopes  :  that,  by  the  ap- 
pointment of  God,  their  captivity  at  Babylon  was  to  last 
seventy  years  ;  and  those  who  remained  in  Judah  and  Jeru- 
salem should  be  so  far  from  being  able  to  effect  any  restora- 
tion for  them,  that  God  would  speedily  send  against  them 
the  sword,  the  famine,  and  the  pestilence,  for  the  consu- 
ming of  the  greatest  part  of  them,  and  scatter  the  rest  over 
the  face  of  the  earth,  to  be  a  curse,  and  an  astonishment,  and 
an  hissing,  and  a  reproach,  among  the  nations,  whither  he 
would  drive  them.  And  therefore  he  exhorts  them  to  pro- 
vide for  tiiemselves  in  the  country  whither  they  are  carried, 
as  settled  inhabitants  of  the  same,  and  comport  themselves 
there  according  to  all  the  duties  which  belong  to  them  as 
such,  without  expecting  any  return  till  the  time  that  God  had 
appointed.  And  as  to  their  false  prophets,  who  had  pro- 
phesied a  lie  unto  them,  he  denounced  God's  curse  against 
Ihem  in  a  speedy  and  fearful  destruction ;  which  accord- 
ingly was  soon  after  executed  upon  them  :  for  Nebuchad- 
nezzar finding  that  they  disturbed  the  people  by  their 
vain  prophecies,  and  hindered  them  from  making  settle- 
ments for  themselves  in  the  places  where  he  had  planted 
them,  caused  them  to  be  seized,  and  roasted  to  death  in  the 
tire.  The  latter  Jews  say,^  that  these  two  men  were  the 
two  elders  who  would  have  corrupted  Susannah,  and  that 
Nebuchadnezzar  commanded  them  to  be  burned  for  this 
reason.  The  whole  foundation  of  this  conceit  is,  that  Jere- 
miah, in  the  twenty-third  verse  of  the  chapter  where  he 
writes  hereof,  accuseth  them  for  committing  adultery  with 
their  neighbours'  wives ;  from  whence  they  conjecture  all 
the  rest. 

These  letters  being  read  to  the  people  of  the  captivity  at 
Babylon,  such  as  were  loath  to  be  dispossessed  of  their  vain 
hopes,  were  much  offended  at  them  ;  and  therefore  Se- 
maiah,  the  Nehelemite,  another  false  pretender  to  prophecy 
among  them,  writing  their  as  well  as   his  own  sentiments 

z  Vide  Oomaram  in  Sfinhedcin. 


BOOK  I.J      THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  165 

hereof,  sent  back  letters  by  the  same  ambassadors,  directing 
them  to  Zephaniah,  the  son  of  Maaseiah,  the  second  priest, 
and  to  all  the  priests  and  people  at  Jerusalem,  wherein  he 
complained  of  Jeremiah  for  writing  the  said  letters,  and  re- 
quired them  to  rebuke  him  for  the  same  ;  which  letters  be- 
ing read  to  Jeremiah,  the  word  of  God  came  unto  him, 
which  denounced  a  very  severe  punishment  upon  Semaiah 
for  the  same. 

In  the  fourth  year  of  Zedekiah,  and  the  fifth  month  of 
that  year,  Hananiah,  the  son  of  Azur  of  Gibeon,* 
took  upon  him  to  prophesy  falsely  in  the  name  of  the  zedek^t 
Lord,  that  within  two  full  years  God  would  bring 
back  all  the  vessels  of  the  house  of  the  Lord  :  and  king  Je- 
coniah,  and  all  the  captives  again  to  Jerusalem ;  whereon, 
the  word  of  the  Lord  came  to  Jeremiah  concerning  Hana- 
niah, that  seeing  he  had  spoken  to  the  people  of  Judah  in 
the  name  of  the  Lord,  who  sent  him  not,  and  had  made 
them  thereby  to  trust  in  a  lie,  he  should  be  smitten  of  God, 
and  die  before  the  year  should  expire  ;  and  accordingly,  he 
died  the  same  year,  in  the  seventh  month,  which  was  within 
two  months  after. 

The  same  year  Jeremiah  had  revealed  unto  him  the  pro- 
phecies which  we  have  in  the  fiftieth  and  fifty-first  chap- 
ters of  Jeremiah,  concerning  God's  judgments  that  were  to 
be  executed  upon  Chaldea  and  Babylon,  by  the  Medes  and 
Persians.  All  which  Jeremiah  wrote  in  a  book,  and  ^  de- 
livered it  to  Seraiah,  the  son  of  Neriah,  and  brother  of  Ba- 
ruch,  who  was  then  sent  to  Babylon  by  Zedekiah,  com- 
manding him,  that,  when  he  should  come  to  Babylon,  he 
should  there  read  the  same  upon  the  banks  of  Euphrates  ; 
and  that,  when  he  should  have  there  made  an  end  of  read- 
ing it,  he  should  bind  a  stone  to  it,  and  cast  it  into  the  midst 
of  the  river,  to  denote  thereby,  that,  as  that  should  sink,  so 
should  Babylon  also  sink,  and  never  rise  any  more ;  which 
has  since  been  fully  verified,  about  two  thousand  years  hav- 
ing now  passed  since  Babylon  hath  been  wholly  desolated, 
and  without  an  inhabitant. 

Baruch  seemeth  to  have  gone  with  his  brother  in  this 
journey  to  Babylon;  for  he  is  said,'^  in  the  apocryphal  book 
that  bears  his  name,  to  have  read  that  book  at  Babylon,  in 
the  hearing  of  king  Jeconiah,  or  Jehoiachin,  and  of  the  el- 
ders and  people  of  the  Jews  then  at  Babylon,  on  the  fifth 
year  after  the  taking  of  Jerusalem  by  the  Chaldeans;  which 
can  be  understood  of  no  other  taking  of  it,  than  that  wherein 
Jehoiachin  was  made  a  captive  :  for,  after  the  last;  taking  of 

a  Ter.  xxvlii.  ]>  .Ter.  li.  59 — ^4.  e  Baruch  i.  I — 4. 


166  CONNEXION    OF  THK    HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

it,  in  the  eleventh  of  Zedekiah,  Baruch  could  not  be  in  Baby- 
lon ;  for,  after  that,  he  went  into  Egypt  with  Jeremiah, 
from  whence  it  is  not  likely  that  he  did  ever  return.  And 
farther,  it  is  said,  in  this  very  book  of  Baruch,  that  after  the 
reading  of  his  book,  as  aforesaid,  a  collection  was  made  at  Ba- 
bylon of  money,  which  was  sent  to  Jerusalem,  to  Joakim, 
the  high-priest,  the  son  of  Hilkiah,  the  son  of  Shallum,  and  to 
the  priests,  and  to  all  the  people  that  were  found  with  him 
at  Jerusalem,  to  buy  burnt-oiferings,  and  sin-offerings,  and 
incense,  and  to  prepare  the  mincha,  and  to  offer  upon  the 
altar  of  the  Lord  their  God  ;  nothing  of  which  could  be  true 
after  the  last  taking  of  Jerusalem  by  the  Chaldeans :  for 
then  the  city  and  temple  were  burnt  and  utterly  destroyed  : 
and  after  that  there  was  no  high-priest,  altar,  altar  service, 
or  people,  to  be  found  at  Jerusalem,  till  the  return  of  the 
Jews  again  thither,  after  the  end  of  their  seventy  years  cap- 
tivity. And,  if  there  were  an}'  such  person  as  Joakim,  (for 
he  is  nowhere  else  named.)  since  he  is  here  said  to  be  the 
son  of  Hilkiah,  the  son  of  Shallum,  he  must  have  been  the 
uncle  of  Seraiah,  who  was  high-priest  at  the  burning  of  the 
temple,  and  grandson  to  tiie  same  Hilkiah  ;  and  therefore  he 
must  have  been  high-priest  before  Seraiah,  if  there  were  any 
such  person  in  that  office  at  all :  for  it  is  certain,  there  were 
none  such  in  it  after  him,  during  the  life  of  Jeconiah.  But 
of  what  authority  this  book  is,  or  by  whom  it  was  written, 
whether  any  thing  related  therein  be  historically  true,  or  the 
whole  of  it  a  fiction,  is  altogether  uncertain.  Grotius*^  thinks 
it  wholly  feigned  by  some  hellenistical  Jew,  under  Baruch's 
name,  and  so  do  many  others  ;  and  it  cannot  be  denied,  but 
that  they  have  strong  reasons  on  their  side.  The  subject  of 
the  book  is  an  epistle  sent,  or  feigned  to  be  sent,  by  king 
Jehoiachin,  and  the  Jews  in  captivity  with  him  at  Babylon, 
to  their  brethren,  the  Jews  that  were  still  left  in  Judah  and 
Jerusalem  ;  with  an  historical  preface  premised,  in  which  it  is 
related,  how  Baruch,  being  then  at  Babylon,  did,  in  the  name 
of  the  said  king,  and  the  people  by  their  appointment,  draw  up 
the  said  epistle,  and  afterward  read  it  to  them  for  their  appro- 
bation ;  and  how  that,  the  collection  being  then  made,  which 
is  above  mentioned,  the  epistle,  with  the  money,  was  sent  to 
Jerusalem.  There  are  three  copies  of  it,  one  in  Greek,  and 
the  other  two  in  Syriac  ;  whereof  one  agreeth  %vith  the  Greek, 
but  the  other  very  much  differs  from  it.  But  in  what  lan- 
guage it  was  originally  written,  or  whether  one  of  these  be 
not  the  original,  or  which  of  them  may  be  so,  is  what  no  one 
can  say.     Jerome  ^  rejected  it  wholly,  because  it  is  not  to 

rJ  In  Comment,  ad  Baruch.  e  Tn  Praefatione  ad  Jeremiam. 


3J00KI.]  THE  etD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  167 

be  found  among  the  Jews,  and  calls  the  epistle  annexed  to 
it  -i-ev$'o'y^cc(pev,  i.  e.  a  false  or  feigned  writing.  The  most  that 
can  be  said  for  it  is,  that  Cyril  of  Jerusalem,  and  the  Laodi- 
cean council,  held  A.  D.  3G4,  both  name  Baruch  among  the 
canonical  books  of  holy  Scripture ;  for,  in  both  the  cata- 
logues which  are  given  us  by  them  of  these  canonical  books, 
are  these  words,  Jeremias,  cum  Baruch,  Lament  at  ionibus,  et 
Epistola,  i.  e.  "  Jeremiah,  with  Baruch,  the  Lamentations, 
and  the  Epistle ;"  whereby  may  seem  to  be  meant  the  pro- 
phecies of  Jeremiah,  the  lamentations  of  Jeremiah,  the  book 
of  Baruch,  with  the  Epistle  of  Jeremiah,  at  the  end  of  it,  as 
they  are  all  laid  together  in  the  vulgar  Latin  edition  of  the 
Bible.  The  answer  given  hereto  is,  that  these  words  were 
intended  by  them  to  express  no  more  than  Jeremiah's  pro- 
phecies and  lamentations  only ;  that  by  the  epistle  is  meant 
no  other  than  the  epistle  in  the  twenty-ninth  chapter  of  Jere- 
miah ;  and  that  Baruch's  name  is  added,  only  because  of 
the  part  which  he  bore  in  collecting  all  these  together,  and 
adding  the  last  chapter  to  the  book  of  his  prophecies  ;  which 
is  supposed  to  be  Baruch's,  because  the  prophecies  of  Jere- 
miah end  with  the  chapter  before,  that  is,  the  fifty-tirst,  as  it 
is  positively  said  in  the  last  words  of  it;  and  it  must  be  said, 
that  since  neither  in  St.  Cyril,  nor  in  the  Laodicean  council, 
any  of  the  other  apocryphal  books  are  named,  it  is  very  un- 
likely that,  by  the  name  of  Baruch  in  either  of  them,  should 
be  meant  the  apocryphal  book,  so  named  ;  which  hath  the 
least  pretence  of  any  of  them  to  be  canonical,  as  it  appeared 
by  the  difficulty  which  the  Trenline. fathers  found  to  make 
it  so.^ 

In  the  fifth  year  of  Zedekiah,  which  was  also  the  fifth  year 
of  Jehoiachin's  captivity,  and  the  thirtieth  from  the 
great  reformation  made  in  the  eighteenth  year  of  king  z'^jek^s. 
Josiah,  Ezekiel°  was  called  of  God  to  be  a  prophet 
among  the  Jews  of  the  captivity.  And  tills  same  year  he 
saw  the  vision  of  the  four  cherubims,  and  the  four  wheels. 
Avhich  is  related  in  the  first  chapter  of  his  prophecies.  The 
same  year  were  also  revealed  unto  him''  the  three  hundred 
and  ninety  years  of  God's  utmost  forbearance  of  the  house  of 
Israel,  and  the  forty  years  of  God's  utmost  forbearance  of 
the  house  of  Judah,  and  the  judgment  which,  after  that,  God 
would  inflict  upon  both  ;  as  the  whole  is  contained  in  the 
iourth,  fifth,  sixth,  and  seventh  chapters  of  his  prophecies. 

In  the  same  year  died  Cyaxares,' king  of  Media,  at^er  he 
had  reigned  forty  years  ;  and  Astyages  his  son,  who  in  Scrip- 
ture is  called  Ahasuerus,  reigned  in  his  stead. 

f  The  History  of  Trent,  book  2,  p.  144.  g  Ezek.  i.  1,  2,  3,  Lc. 

h  Ezsk.  iv.  4,  5,  ti,  &c  i  Iterod.  lili.  1, 


168  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART  I« 

In  the  same  year  died  also  Psammis,^  king  of  Egypt,  in  an 
expedition  which  he  made  against  the  Ethiopians ;  and 
Apries  his  son,  the  same  who  in  Scripture  is  called  Pharaoh 
Hophra,  succeeded  him  in  that  kingdom,  and  reigned  twenty- 
five  years. 

In  the  same  year  Ezekiel,  being  in  a  vision,  was  carried 
to  Jerusalem,  and  there  shown  all  the  several  sorts  of  idola- 
try which  were  practised  by  the  Jews  in  that  place,  and  had 
revealed  unto  him  the  punishments  which  God  would  inflict 
upon  them  for  those  abominations ;  and  this  makes  up  the 
subject  of  the  eighth,  ninth,  tenth,  and  eleventh  chapters  of 
his  prophecies.  But  at  the  same  time,  God  promised  to  those 
of  the  captivity,'  who,  avoiding  these  abominaiions,  kept 
themselves  steady  and  faithful  to  his  service,  that  he  would 
become  a  sanctuary  unto  them  in  the  strange  land  where  they 
were  carried,  and  bring  them  back  again  unto  the  land  of 
Israel,  and  there  make  them  flourish  in  peace  and  righteous- 
ness, as  in  former  times.  All™  which  the  prophet  declared 
to  the  Jews  at  Babylon,  among  whom  he  dwelt. 

In  the  seventh  year  of  Zedekiah,  God  did,  both  by  types 
and  words  of  revelation,  foreshow  unto  Ezekiel  the 
zedek\  taking  of  Jerusalem  by  the  Chaldeans,  Zedekiah's 
flight  from  thence  by  night,  the  putting  out  of  his  eyes, 
and  his  imprisonment  and  death  at  Babylon  ;  and  also  the 
carrying  away  of  the  Jews  at  the  same  time  into  captivity, 
the  desolation  of  their  country,  and  the  many  and  great  ca- 
lamities which  should  befall  them  for  their  iniquities :  and 
this  is  the  subject  of  the  twelfth  chapter  of  his  prophecies. 
And  what  is  contained  in  the  seven  following  chapters  was 
also  the  same  year  revealed  unto  him,  and  relates  mostly  to 
the  same  subject. 

At  this  time  Daniel  was  grown  to  so  great  a  perfection 
and  eminency  in  all  righteousness,  holiness,  and  piety  of  life, 
in  the  sight  both  of  God  and  man,  that"  he  is  by  God  himself 
equalled  with  Noah  and  Job,  and  reckoned  with  these  two 
to  make  up  the  three,  who  of  all  the  saints  that  had  till  then 
lived  upon  the  earth,  had  the  greatest  power  to  prevail  with 
God  in  their  prayers  for  others.  And  yet  he  was  then  but 
a  young  man  ;  for,  allowing  him  to  be  eighteen  when  he  was 
carried  away  to  Babylon,  among  other  children,  to  be  there 
educated,  and  brought  up  for  the  service  of  the  king,  (and  a 
greater  will  not  agree  with  this  character^)  thirty-two  at  this 
time  must  have  been  the  utmost  of  his  age-  But  he  dedicated 
the  prime  and  vigour  of  his  lite  to  the  service  of  God:  and 
that  is  the  best  time  to  make  proliciency  therein. 

k  Herod,  lib.  ii&.  1  Ezek.  si.  15—21 

m  Ezek.  xi.iJ.5.  n  Ezek.  xiv.  14.20' 


BOOK  I.]      THE  OLD  AND  NEW   TESTAMENTS.  169 

Zedekiah,  having  in  the  seventh  year  of  his  reign  sent 
ambassadors  into  Egypt,"  made  a  confederacy  with 
Pharaoh  Hophra,   king  of  Egypt ;  and  therefore,  the  ztdekfk 
next  year,  after  breaking  the  oath  of  fidehty  which 
he   had  sworn  in  the  name  of  the  Lord  his  God  unto  Nebu- 
chadnezzar, king  of  Babylon,  he  rebelled  against  him  ;  which 
drew  on  him  that   war  which  ended  in  his  ruin,  and  in  the 
ruin  of  all  Judah  and  Jerusalem  with  him,  in  that  calamitous 
destruction  in  which  both  were  involved  hereby. 

In  the  ninth  year  of  Zedekiah,?  Nebuchadnezzar,  having 
drawn  together  a  great  army  out  of  all  the  nations  under 
his  dominion,  marched  against  him  to  punish  him  for  zedek^'. 
his  perfidy  and  rebellion.  But  on  his  coming  into  Syria, 
finding  that  the  Ammonites  had  also  entered  into  the  same  con- 
federacy with  Egypt  against  him,  he  was  'J  in  a  doubt  for  some 
time  which  of  these  two  people  he  should  first  fall  upon,  them, 
or  the  Jews  ;  whereon  he  committed  the  decision  of  the  matter 
to  his  diviners,  who,  consulting  by  the  entrails  of  their  sacri- 
fices, their  teraphim,  and  their  arrows,  determined  for  the 
carrying  of  the  war  against  the  Jews.  The  way  of  divining 
by  arrows  was  usual  among  these  idolaters.  The  manner  of 
it,  Jerome*"  tells  us,  was  thus :  They  wrote  on  several  arrows 
the  names  of  the  cities  they  intended  to  make  war  against, 
and  then  putting  them  promiscuously  all  together  intoaquiver, 
they  caused  them  to  be  drawn  out  thence  in  the  manner  as 
they  draw  lots  ;  and  that  city,  whose  name  was  on  the  arrow 
first  drawn,  was  the  first  they  assaulted.  And  by  this  way  of 
divination,  the  war  being  determined  against  Judah,  Nebu- 
chadnezzar immediately  marched  his  army  into  that  country, 
and  in  a  (ew  days^  took  all  the  cities  thereof  excepting  only 
Lachish,  Azekah,  and  Jerusalem :  whereon  the  Jews  at 
Jerusalem,  being  terrified  with  these  losses,  and  the  ap- 
prehensions of  a  siege,  then  ready  to  be  laid  to  that  place, 
made  a  show  of  returning  unto  the  Lord  their  God,  and 
entered  into  a  solemn  covenant,  thenceforth  to  serve  him 
only,  and  faithfully  observe  all  his  laws.  And  in  pursuance 
hereof,'  proclamation  was  made,  that  every  man  should 
let  his  man-servant,  and  every  man  his  maid-servant, 
being  an  Hebrew  or  an  Hebrewess,  go  free,  "  according  to 
the  law  of  God  ;  and  every  man  did  according  hereto. 

On  the  tenth  month  of  the  same  year,^  and  the  tenth  day 
of  the  month,  (which  was  about  the  end  of  our  December,) 
Nebuchadnezzar,  with  all  his  numerous  army,  laid  siege  to 

o  Kzek.  svii.  15. 
1)2  Kings  xsv.  1.    2  Cbroii.  xxxvi.  17.    Jer.  xxxix.  1  ;   Hi.  4. 
q  Ezek.  xxi.  19 — 24.  r  In  comment,  in  Ezek.  xxii 

s  Jer.  xxsiv.  7.  t  Jer.  xxxiv.  8 — 10. 

u  Deut.  XV.  12.  X  2  Kings  sxv.  1.  Jer.  xxxis.  I  ;  lii.  4. 

Vol.  I.  22 


All.  5S9. 
Zedek 


170  CONiNEXION  OF  THE  lilSTORY  OF  [PAUT   X. 

Jerusalem,  and  blocked  it  close  up  on  every  side  ;  in  memo- 
ry whereof,  the  tenth  day  of  Tebeth,  which  is  their  tenth 
month,  hath  ever  since  been  observed  by  the  Jews,*  as  a 
day  of  solemn  fast  even  to  this  time. 

On  the  same  tenth  day  of  the  tenth  month,'^  in  which  this 
siege  began  at  Jerusalem,  was  the  same  revealed  to  Ezekiel 
in  Chaldea  ;  where,  by  the  type  of  a  boiling  pot,  was  fore- 
shown unto  him  the  dismal  destruction  which  should  thereby 
be  brought  upon  that  city.  And  the  ^  same  night,  the  wife  of 
the  prophet,  who  was  the  desire  of  his  eyes,  was  by  a  sudden 
stroke  of  death,  taken  from  him  ;  and  he  was  forbid  by  God 
to  make  any  manner  of  mourning  for  her,  or  appear  with  any 
of  the  usual  signs  of  it  upon  him,  thereby  to  foreshow, 
that  the  holy  city,  the  temple,  and  the  sanctuary,  which  were 
dearer  to  them  than  any  wife  can  be  in  the  eyes  of  her  hus- 
band, should  not  only  by  a  speedy  and  sudden  stroke  of  de- 
struction be  taken  from  them,  but  that  the  calamity  ensu- 
ing thereon  should  be  such  and  so  great,  as  should  not  allow 
them  as  much  as  to  mourn  for  the  loss  of  them. 

In  the  beginning  of  the  tenth  year  of  Zedekiah,^  the  pro- 
phet Jeroniiah,  being  sent  of  God,  declared  unto  him, 
f",o.  that  the  Babylonians,  who  were  now  besieging  of  the 
city,  should  certainly  take  it,  and  burn  it  with  fire, 
and  take  him  prisoner,  and  carry  him  to  Babylon  ;  and  that 
he  should  die  theie.  Whereon  *^  Zedekiah,  being  much  dis- 
pleased, put  him  in  prison,  and,  while  he  was  shut  up  there, 
even  in  this  very  year,"*  he  purchased  of  Hanameel,  his 
uncle's  son,  a  field  in  Anathoth  ;  thereby  to  foreshow,  that 
although  Judah  and  Jerusalem  should  be  laid  desolate,  and 
the  inhabitants  led  into  captivity,  yet  there  should  be  a  resto- 
ration, when  lands  and  possessions  should  be  again  enjoyed 
by  the  legal  owners  of  then),  in  the  same  manner  as  in  for- 
mer times. 

Pharaoh  Hophra'*  coming  out  of  Egypt  with  a  great  army 
to  tfje  relief  of  Zedekiah,  Nebuchadnezzar  raised  the  siege 
of  Jerusalem  to  march  against  hirn.  But  before  he  went  on 
this  expedition.'  he  sent  all  the  captive  Jews  which  he  then 
had  in  his  camp  to  Babylon,  the  number  of  which  were 
eight  hundred  and  thirty-two  persons. 

On  the  departure  of  the  Chaldeans  from  Jerusalem,  Jere- 
miah being  again  set  at  liberty ,s  Zedekiah  sent  unto  him  Je- 
hucal,  the  son  of  Shelemiah,  and  Zephaniah,  the  son  of  Maa- 
seiah,  the  priest,  to  inquire  of  the  Lord  by  him,  and  to  desire 
him  to  pray  for  him  and  his  people.  To  whom  the  prophet 
returned  an  answer  from  God,  that  the  Egyptians,  whom  they 

y  Zech.  viii.  19.  z  Ezek.  xxiv.  1,  2.  a  Ezek.  xsiv.  16 — 18 

b  Jer.  xxiv.  c  Jer.  xxxii.  1 — 3.  d  Jer.  xxxii.  7 — 17. 

p  .Ter.  xxxvii.  .5  f  .Tei*.  lii.  29  g  .Ter.  xxxvii.  3 — If* 


BOOK  I.J       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  171 

did  depend  upon,  would  certainly  deceive  Ihem  ;  that  their 
army  would  again  return  into  Egypt  without  giving  them  any 
help  at  all  ;  and  that  thereon  the  Chaldeans  would  again  re- 
new the  siege,  take  the  city,  and  burn  it  with  tire. 

But  the  general  opinion  of  the  people  being,  that  the  Chal- 
deans were  gone  for  good  and  all,  and  would  return  no  more 
to  renew  the  war  against  them,  they*"  repented  of  the  cove- 
nant of  reformation  which  they  had  entered  into  before  God, 
when  they  were  in  fear  of  them  ;  and  caused  every  man's 
servant,  and  every  man's  handmaids,  whom  they  had  set  at 
liberty,  again  to  return  into  servitude,  to  be  unto  them  again 
for  servants  and  for  handmaids,  contrary  to  the  law  of  the 
Lord,  and  the  covenant  which  they  had  lately  entered  into 
with  him,  to  walk  according  to  it.  For'  which  inhuman  and 
unjust  act,  and  their  impious  breach  of  tlie  covenant  lately 
made  with  God,  Jeremiah  proclaimed  liberty  to  the  sword, 
the  famine,  and  the  pestilence,  to  execute  the  wrath  of  God 
upon  them,  and  their  king,  and  their  princes,  and  all  Judah 
and  Jerusulem  to  their  utter  destruction. 

While  the  Chaldeans  were  yet  absent  from  Jerusalem,*^ 
Jeremiah  intending  to  retire  to  Anathoth,  his  native  place, 
that  thereby  he  mightavoid  the  siege,  which  he  knew  would  be 
again  renewed  on  the  return  of  the  Chaldeans  from  their  expedi- 
tion against  the  Egyptians,  put  himself  on  his  journey  thither  ; 
but,  as  he  was  passing  the  gate  of  the  city  that  led  that  way,  the 
captain,  that  kept  guard  there,  seized  him  for  a  deserter, 
as  if  his  intentions  were  to  fall  away  to  the  Chaldeans  ;  where- 
on he  was  again  put  in  prison  in  the  house  of  Jonathan  the 
scribe,  which  they  had  made  the  common  jail  of  the  city, 
where  he  remained  many  days. 

The  Egyptians,  on  the  coming  of  the  Chaldeans  against 
them,  durst  not  stay  to  engage  in  battle  with  so  numerous 
and  well-appointed  an  army  ;  but,'  withdrawing  on  their  ap- 
proach, retired  again  into  their  own  country,  treacherously 
leaving  Zedekiah  and  his  people  to  perish  in  that  war  which 
they  had  drawn  them  into.  Whereon'"  the  prophet  Ezekiel 
reproaching  them  for  their  perfidy,  in  thus  becoming  a  staff 
of  reed  to  those,  whom  by  oaths  and  covenants  of  alliance 
they  had  made  to  lean  and  confide  on  them,  denounced  God's 
judgments  against  them,  to  be  executed  both  upon  king  and 
people  in  war,  confusion,  and  desolation,  for  forty  years  en- 
suing, for  the  punishment  hereof;  and  also  foretold"  how. 
after  that,  they  should  sink  low,  and  become  a  mean  and  base 
people,  and  should  no  more  have  a  prince  of  their  own  to  reign 

Ij  Jer.  xxxiv.  11.  i  Jer.  xxxiv.  IT — 22.  k  Jer.  xxxvii.  11 — ].') 

1  Jer.  xswii.  7.  m  Ezek.  -lix'w.  n  Ezek.  xxx.  13 


]72  (-O.VNEMO.V  OK   TFIK   H18TOKY   OK  [I'ART  1. 

over  them.  Which  hath  accordingly  come  to  pass  ;  for,  not 
long  after  the  expiration  of  the  said  forty  years,  they  were 
made  a  province  of  the  Persian  empire,  and  have  been 
governed  by  strantjcrs  ever  since  ;  for  on  the  faihire  of  the 
Persian  empire,  they  became  snbject  to  the  Macedonians, 
and  after  them  to  the  Romans,  and  after  the  Romans  to  the 
Saracens,  and  then  to  the  Mamalukcs,  and  are  now  a  pro- 
vince of  the  Turkish  empire. 

On  the  retreat  of  the  Kgyplians,  Nebuchadnezzar  "  return- 
ed to  Jerusalem,  and  again  renewed  the  siege  of  that  place  ; 
whicli  lasted  about  a  year  from  the  second  investing  of  it,  to 
the  time  when  it  was  taken. 

The  siege  being  tiuis  renewed,  Zcdckiah  sent  for  Jeremiah^ 
out  of  prison  to  consult  with  him,  and  incpiire  of  him  what 
word  there  was  tiom  (Jod  concerning  the  present  state  of  his 
affairs;  to  which  he  found  there  was  no  other  answer,  but 
that  he  was  to  be  delivered  into  the  hands  of  the  king  of 
Babylon.  However,  at  the  entreaty  of  the  prophet,  he  was 
prevailed  with  not  to  send  him  back  again  to  the  common  jail  of 
the  city,  lost  he  should  die  there  by  reason  of  the  noisomoness 
of  the  place,  and  therefore  instead  thereof,  he  was  ordered 
to  the  prison  of  the  king's  court,  where  he  continued  with  the 
allowance  of  a  certain  portion  of  bread  out  of  the  common 
store,  till  (he  city  was  taken. 

Zcdckiah,  fuiding  himself  in  the  siege  much  pressed  by 
(he  Chaldeans.''  scnl  messengers  to  Jeremiah,  farther  to  in- 
quire of  the  Lord  hy  liim  concerning  (he  present  war.  To 
which  he  answered,  that  (he  word  of  (he  Lord  concerning 
him  was,  that  God,  being  very  much  provoked  against  him 
and  his  people  for  their  iniquities,  would  tight  against  the 
city,  and  smile  it  ;  that  both  king  and  people  should  be  de- 
livered into  (he  hands  of  the  king  of  Babylon;  that  those  who 
continued  in  the  city  during  the  siege. should  perish  bythe  pes- 
tilence, the  fannne.  and  the  sword  ;  but  (hat  those  who  should 
go  out  and  fall  (o  (he  Chaldeans,  should  have  (heir  lives  given 
them  for  a  prey.  At  which  answer,""  several  of  (he  princes 
and  chief  commanders  about  (he  king,  being  very  much  of- 
fended, pressed  (he  king  against  him,  as  one  (hat  weakened 
the  hands  of  the  men  of  war,  and  of  all  the  people,  and  sought 
their  hurt  more  than  their  good  :  whereon  he  being  deliver- 
ed into  their  hands,  they  cast  him  into  a  dungeon,  where  he 
must  have  perished,  but  (hat''  Kbodmelech,  an  eunuch  of  the 
court,  having  entreated  the  king  in  his  behalf,  delivered  him 
thence  ;  for  which  charitable  act  he  had  a  message  sent  him 
from  God  of  mercy  and  deliverance  unto  him.  Af(er  this. 
'  Zcdckiah  sending  for  Jeremiah  into  the  temple,  there  secrct- 

o  .Ter.  xxwii.  8.  ))  .lor.  xxsvii.  17 — 21.         <|.Ter.  xxi.  1    -H. 

r  .Tpr.  xxxviii.  1  — •>.         s  .ler.  xxxviii.T — I'-i.  t  .Tor.  sxxviit.  14 —   2o. 


JiOOK  I.J  THi:  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMKNTS.  ilo 

]y  inquired  of  him  ;  but  had  no  other  answer,  than  what  had 
1)ccn  afore  given  him,  saving  only,  (hat  the  prophet  (old  him, 
that,  if  he  would  go  forthwith  and  deliver  himself  into  (he 
hands  of  the  king  of  Babylon's  princes,  who  commanded  at 
the  carrying  on  of  the  siege,  this  was  (he  only  vvay  whereby 
he  migh(  save  bolh  himself  and  (he  city  ;  and  he  earnestly 
pressed  him  hereto.  But  Zedekiah  would  not  hearken  unto 
him  herein,  but  sent  him  back  again  to  prison,  and  after  (hat 
no  more  consulted  with  him. 

In  the  eleventh  year  of  Zedekiah,  in  (he  beginning  of  the 
year,  God  declared  by  (he  prophet  Ezekiel,  his 
judgments  against  'I'yre,  for  their  insulting  on  (he  zejel'^ii. 
calamitous  s(ate  of  Judah  and  Jerusalem  ;  foreshow- 
ing, that  (he  same  calami(ies  should  also  be  brought  upon 
them  by  the  same  Nebuchadnezzar,  into  whose  hands  God 
would  deliver  them  ;  and  this  is  the  subject  of  the  twenty- 
sixth,  twenty-seventh,  and  twenty  eighth  chapters  of  his  pro- 
phecies; in  the  last  of  which  God  particularly  upbraideth  Itho- 
bal,  then  king  of  Tyre,  with  the  insolent  and  proud  conceit 
he  had  of  his  own  knowledge  and  unders(anding,  having  puffed 
up  himself  herewith,  as  "  if  he  were  wiser  than  Daniel ;"  and 
that  there  was  no  secret  that  could  be  hid  from  him  :"  which 
showeth  to  how  great  an  height  (he  fame  of  Daniel's  wis- 
dom was  at  that  time  grown,  since  it  now  became  spoken  of, 
by  way  of  proverb,  through  all  (he  east;  and  yet,  according 
to  the  account  above  given  of  his  age,  he  could  not  at  (his 
ti(ne  exceed  (hirty-six  years.  And,  in  the  conclusion  of  the 
twenty-eighth  chapter,  (he  like  judgtncnis  are  denounced 
also  against  Sidon,  and  for  the  same  reason. 

The  same  year  God  declared,  by  the  same  prophet,  his 
judgments  against  Pharaoh  and  the  Egyptians:  (ha(  he  would 
bring  the  king  of  Babylon  against  them,  and  deliver  them 
into  his  hands ;  and  that  notwithstanding  their  greatness  and 
pride,  they  should  no  more  escape  his  revenging  hand  than  the 
Assyrians  had  done  beforethem,  wlio- were  higher  and  greater 
than  (hey.  And  this  is  the  subject  of  the  thirtieth  and  thirty- 
first  chapters  of  his  prophecies. 

In  the  fourth  month,  on  the  ninth  day  of  the  month,  oi' 
the  same  eleventh  year  of  Zedekiah,''  Jerusalem  was  taken 
by  (he  Chaldeans,  after  the  siege  had  lasted  from  their  last 
sitting  down  before  it,  about  a  ^ear.  Hereon  Zedekiah,  with 
his  men  of  war,  fled  away  :  and  having  broken  through  the 
camp  of  the  enemy,  endeavoured  to  make  his  escape  over 
Jordan  :  but,  being  pursued  after,  he   was  overtaken  in  the 

II  Ezek.  xxviii.  ;>. 

X  2  Kings  XXV.  4.     2  Clirnn.  xxvi.  IT,     .lor.  xxxix.  2—10  :  liii.  6— 1  t 


174  CONNEXION'  Oh'  THt   UlSIORV  OF  [PART   I. 

plains  of  Jericho  :  whereon  all  his  army  being  scattered  from 
him,  he  was  taken  prisoner,  and  carried  to  the  king  of  Baby- 
lon at  Riblah  in  Syria,  where  he  then  resided  ;  who,  having 
can  cd  his  sons,  and  all  his  princes  that  were  taken  with  him, 
to  be  slain  before  his  face,  commandt  d  his  eyes  to  be  put 
out,  and  then  bound  him  in  fetters  of  brass,  and  sent  him  to 
Babylon,  where  he  died  in  prison:  and  hereb}  was  fulfilled 
the  prophecy  of  the  prophet  Ezekiel^  concerning  him,  That 
he  should  be  brought  to  Babylon  in  the  land  of  the  Chal- 
deans, yet  should  not  see  the  place,  though  he  should  die 
there. 

In  the  fifth  month,  on  the  seventh  day  of  the  month,  (i.  c. 
towards  the  end  of  our  July,)  came  Nebuzaradan,^  captain  of 
the  guards,  to  the  king  of  Babylon  to  Jerusalem  ;  and,  after 
having  taken  out  all  the   vessels   of  the  house  of  the  Lord, 
and  gathered  together  all  the  riches  that  could  be  found,  either 
in  the  king's  house  or  in  any  of  the  other  houses  of  the  city, 
ht'  did,  on  the  tenth  day  of  the  same  month,  pursuant  to  the 
command  of  his  master,  set  both  the  temple  and  city  on  fire, 
and  absolutely   consumed  and  destroyed    them    both,  over- 
throwing all  the  walls,  fortresses,  and  towers  belonging  there- 
to, and  wholly  razing  and  levelling  to  the  ground  every  build- 
ing therein,  till  he  had  brought  all  to  a  thorough  and  pt-rfect 
desolation  ;  and  so  it  continued  for  fifty-two  years  after,  till, 
by  the   favour  of  Cyrus,  the  Jews  being  released  from  their 
captivity, and  restored  again  to  their  own  land,  repaired  these 
ruins,  and  built   again   their  holy  city.      In   memory  of  this 
calamity,  they  keep   two   fasts,  even  to  this   day,  th(!  seven- 
teenth of  the  fourth  month  (which  falls  in  our  June)  for  the 
destruction  of  Jerusalem,  and  the   ninth  of  the  fifth  month 
(which  falls  in  our  July)  for  the  destruction  of  the  temple  ; 
both   which  are  made  mention  of  in  the  prophesies  of  the 
prophet  Zechariah,*    under  the  names  of   the   fast   of   the 
fourth    month,   and    the    fast  of  the    fifth   month,    and    arc 
there  spoken  of  as  annually  observed  from  the  destruction 
of  Jerusalem  to  his  time,   which  was    seventy  years  after. 
Josephus''  remarks,  that  the  burning  of  the  temple  by  Nebu- 
chadnezzar happened  on  the  very  same  day  of  the  year  on 
which  it  was  afterward  again  burned  by  litus. 

Nebuzaradan,  having  thus  destroyed  the  city  and  the  tem- 
ple of  Jerusalem,  made  all  the  people  he  found  there  cap- 
tives. Of  these,^  he  took  Seraiah  the  high-priest,  and  Ze- 
phaniah  the  second  priest,  and  about  seventy  others  of  the 
principal  persons  he  found  in  the  place,  and  carried  them  to 

y  Ezek.  xii.  13.  z  2  Kings  xsv.  8—17.     Jer.  lii.  12 — 23. 

a  Zechariah  viii.  19.  b  De  Bello  .Tndaico,  lib.  vii.  c.   10 

c  2  Kings  XXV.  IR— 21 .     .Ter.  lii.  24 — 27 


BOOK  I.]  THE  OLD  ANld  NEW  TESTAWKrv Ts.  173 

Riblah  to  Nebuchadnezzar,  who  caused  them  all  there  to  be 
put  to  death.  Of  the  rest  of  the  people,  he  left  the  poorer 
sort  to  till  the  ground,  and  dress  their  vineyards,  and  made 
Gedaliah,  the  son  of  Ahikam,  governor  over  them,  and  all 
the  other  he  carried  awa)  to  Bab^lon.'^ 

But  concerning  Jeremiah,^  Nebuchadnezzar  gave  particu- 
lar charge  to  Nebuzaradan,  that  he  should  offer  him  no  hurt, 
but  look  well  to  him,  and  do  for  him  in  all  things  according 
as  he  should  desire.  And  theretbre  as  soon  as  he  came  to 
Jerusalem,  with  commission  to  destroy  the  place,  he  and  the 
princes  that  were  with  him  sent  and  took  him  out  of  prison, 
where  he  had  lain  bound  from  the  time  that  Zedekiah  had  put 
him  there,  and  restored  him  to  his  liberty  ;  and,  having  car- 
ried him  with  him  as  far  as  Ramah,  on  his  return  to  Nebu- 
chadnezzar, he  then  gave  him  his  option,  whether  he  would 
go  with  him  to  Babylon,  where  he  should  be  well  looked 
after,  and  maintained  at  the  king's  charge,  or  else  remain  in 
the  land  ;  and  he  having  chosen  the  latter,  Nebuzaradan  gave 
him  victuals  and  a  reward,  and  sent  him  back  to  Gedaliah 
the  son  of  Ahikam,  with  an  especial  charge  to  take  care  of 
him. 

After  Nebuchadnezzar  was  returned  to  Babylon, *^  all  those 
who  before,  for  fear  of  the  Chaldeans,  had  taken  refuge  among 
the  neighbouring  nations,  or  had  hid  themselves  in  the  fields 
and  the  deserts,  after  their  escape  on  the  dispersion  of 
Zedekiah's  army  in  the  plains  of  Jericho,  hearing  that  Geda- 
liah was  made  governor  of  the  land,  resorted  to  him  ;  and, 
he  having  promised  them  protection,  and  sworn  unto  them, 
that  they  should  be  safe  under  his  government,  they  settled 
themselves  again  in  the  land,  and  gathered  in  the  fruits  of  it. 
The  chief  among  these  were  Johanan  and  Jonathan,  the 
sons  of  Kereah,  Seraiah  the  son  of  Tanhumeth,  Azariah  the 
son  of  Hoshaiah,  Ishmael  the  son  of  Nethaniah,  and  others. 

But  Ishmael  came  to  him  only  out  of  a  treacherous  de- 
sign ;^  for,  being  of  the  seed-royal,  he  reckoned  to  make  him- 
self king  of  the  land,  now  the  Chaldeans  were  gone;  and, 
for  the  accomplishing  of  it,  had  formed  a  conspiracy  to  kill 
Gedaliah,  and  seize  the  government ;  and  Baalis,  the  king  of 
the  Ammonites,  was  confederated  with  him  herein.  But  Jo- 
hanan, the  son  of  Kereah,  having  got  notice  of  it,  he  and  all 
the  chief  men  of  the  rest  of  the  people,  went  to  Gedaliah, 
and  informed  him  of  it,  proposing  to  kill  Ishmael,  and  there- 
by deliver  him  from  the  mischief  that  was  intended  against 
him.     Bui  Gedaliah  being  of  a  very  benign  disposition,  and 

ti  2  Kings  XXV.  22—25.    Jer  xxxix.  9,  10 ;  and  lii.  15,  16. 
e  Jer.  sxxix.  1 1—14  ;  h  xl.  1—6.       f  Jer.  x1.  7—12. 
2  Jer.  xl.  13—16. 


176  CONNEXION  OF   XHi;  HISTORY   Ot  [PARX  I. 

not  easy  to  entertain  jealousies  of  any  one,  would  not  believe 
this  of  Ishmael,  but  still  carried  on  a  friendly  correspondence 
with  him;''  of  which  Ishmael  taking  theadvantage, came  to  him 
in  the  seventh  month,  (whicti  answers  to  our  September)  when 
the  people  were^most  of  them  scattered  abroad  from  him  to 
gather  in  the  fruits  of  the  land,  and  while  they  were  eating 
and  drinking  together  at  an  entertainment,  whiih  Gedaliah 
had  in  a  very  friendl}  manner  made  for  him,  and  his  men, 
they  rose  upon  him,  and  slew  him,  and  at  the  same  time, 
slew  also  a  great  number  of  the  Jews  and  Chaldeans,  whom 
they  found  with  hun  in  Mizpah,  and  took  the  rest  captive. 
And  the  next  day,  hearing  of  eighty  men,  who  were  going  on 
a  religious  account,  with  offerings  and  incense  to  the  house 
of  God,'  they  craftily  drew  them  into  Mizpah,  and  there  slew 
them  all,  excepting  ten  of  them,  who  ottered  their  stores 
for  the  redemption  of  their  lives.  And  then  taking  with 
them  all  the  captives,  among  whom  were  the  daughters  of 
king  Zedekiah,  they  departed  thence  to  go  over  to  the  Am- 
monites. But  Johanaii  the  son  of  Kereah,  and  the  rest  of  the 
captains,  hearing  of  this  wicked  act,  immediatel}  armed  as 
many  of  the  people  as  they  could  get  together,  and  pursued 
after  Ishmael;  and,  having  overtaken  him  atGibeon,  retook 
all  the  captives  ;  but  he  and  eight  of  his  men  escaped  to  the 
Ammonites.  This  murder  of  Gedaliah  happened  two  months 
after  the  destruction  of  the  city  and  temple  of  Jerusalem,  in 
the  said  seventh  month,  and  on  the  thirtieth  day  of  the  month. 
For  that  day  the  Jews  have  kept  as  a  fast  in  commemoration 
of  this  calamity  ever  since  ;  and  Zechariah''  also  makes  men- 
tion of  it  as  observed  in  his  time,  calling  it  b)  tlie  name  of 
the  fast  of  the  stvodh  month  ;  and  the)  had  reason  to  keep  a 
fast  for  it,  for  it  was  the  completion  of  their  ruin. 

After  this  great  misfortune,  Johanan.'  the  son  of  Kereah, 
and  the  people  that  were  left,  fearing  the  king  of  Babylon, 
because  of  the  murder  of  Gedaliah,  whom  he  had  made  go- 
vernorof  the  land,  departed  from  Mizpah,  to  flee  into  the  land 
of  Eg)  pt,  and  came  to  Bethlehem  in  their  way  thither  :  where 
they  stopping  a  wliile,  consulted  the  prophet  Jeremiah  (whom 
they  had  carried  with  them;  about  their  intended  journey, 
and  desired  him  to  iiiquire  of  God  in  their  behalf;  who,  after 
ten  days,  having  received  an  answer  iVom  God,  called  them 
together,  and  told  them,  that  if  they  would  tarry  in  the  land, 
ail  should  go  well  with  them,  and  God  would  show  mercy 
unto  them,  and  incline   the  heart  of  the  king  of  Babylon  to 

h  .ler.  xli. 

i  That  is,  at  Jerusalem  ;  lor  though  the  temple  was  destroyed,  yet  the 
people  that  were  left,  continued  to  otfer  sacrifices  and  worship  there  on  the 
place  where  it  stood,  as  long  as  they  remained  in  the  land. 

k  Zechariah  viii.  10  1  Jeremiah  lii. 


nOOK  I.j  THE  OLD  AM)  NEW  TESTAMEM'3.  l77 

be  favourable  unto  them  ;  but  if  they  would  not  hearken 
unto  the  word  of  the  Lord,  but  would,  notwithstanding  his 
word  now  delivered  to  the  contrary,  set  their  faces  to  go  into 
the  land  of  Egypt,  that  then  the  sword  and  famine  should  fol- 
low close  after  them  thither,  and  they  should  be  all  there  de- 
stroyed. But  all  this  was  of  no  effect  with  them  :  for,  their 
hearts  being  violently  bent  to  go  into  Egypt,  they  would  not 
hearken  to  the  word  of  the  Lord  spoken  to  them  by  the 
mouth  of  his  prophet,  but  told  Jeremiah  that  the  answer 
which  he  gave  them  was  not  from  God,  but  was  sug- 
gested to  him  by  Baruch  the  son  of  Neriah  for  their  hurt. 
And  therefore  Johanan  the  son  of  Kereah,  and  the  rest  of 
the  captains  of  the  forces,  took  all  the  remnant  of  Judah 
that  were  returned  from  all  nations  whither  they  had  been 
driven  again  to  dwell  in  the  land,  and  all  the  persons  whom 
Nebuzaradan  had  left  with  Gedaliah,  even  men,  women,  and 
children,  and  the  king's  daughters,  and  also  Jeremiah  the 
prophet,  and  Baruch  the  son  of  Neriah,  and  went  into  Egypt, 
and  settled  in  that  country,  till  the  plagues  and  judgments 
which  God  had  threatened  them  with,  for  their  disobedience 
to  his  word,  there  overtook  them,  to  their  utter  destruction. 
And  thus  ended  this  unfortunate  year,  in  which  the  temple 
and  city  of  Jerusalem  were  destroyed,  and  the  whole  land 
of  Judah  brought  in  a  manner  to  utter  desolation  for  the  sins 
thereof. 


Vol.  I  ^S 


THt 


OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS 

CONNECTED,  &lc. 


BOOK  II. 

In  the  twelfth  year  of  the  captivity  of  Jehoiachin,  one 

escaping  from  Jerusalem  came  to  Ezekiel  in  the  land 

^•ebucha(l-  of  the  Chaldeans,  and  told  him  of  the  destruction  of 

the  city ;  whereon  he  prophesied  desolation  to  the  rest 

of  the  land  of  Judah,  and  utter  destruction  to  the  remainder 

of  the  Jews  who  were  left  therein.* 

The  same  year  Ezekiel  prophesied  against  Egypt,  and 
Pharaoh  Hophra,  the  king  thereof,  that  God  would  bring 
against  him  Nebuchadnezzar,  king  of  Babylon,  who  should 
lay  the  land  desolate  :  and  that  he  and  all  his  armies  should 
be  brought  to  destruction,  and  perish,  like  as  other  nations 
whom  God  had  cut  off  for  their  iniquities  :  which  is  the  sub- 
ject of  the  thirty-second  chapter  of  his  prophecies. 

The  Jews  which  went  into  Egypt,''  having  settled  at  Mig- 
dol,  and  Tahpanhes,  and  Noph,  and  in  the  country  of  Pathros, 
(t.  e.  at  Magdalum  by  the  Red  Sea,  at  Daphne  near  Pelu- 
sium,  at  Memphis,  and  in  the  country  of  Thebais,)'  gave 
themselves  there  wholly  up  to  idolatry,*^  worshipping  the 
queen  of  heaVen,  and  other  false  deities  of  the  land,  and 
burning  incense  unto  them,  without  having  any  more  re- 
gard to  the  Lord  their  God.  Whereon  the  prophet  Jere- 
miah^ cried  aloud  against  this  impiety,  unto  those  among 
whom  he  lived,  that  is,  those  who  had  settled  in  the  land  of 
Pathros  or  Thebais.*^  (For  this  being  the  farthest  from  Ju- 
dea  of  all  the  places  where  they  had  obtained  settlements 
in  that  country,  they  had  carried  him  thither,  the  better  to 
take  from  him  all  opportunity  of  again  returning  from  them.) 
But  all  his  exhortations  were  of  no  other  effect,  than  to  draw 

a  Ezek.  xxsiii.  21 — 29.  b  Jer.  xliv.  1. 

c  VideBoch.Phal.  p.  1,  lib.  4,  c.  27  d  Jer.  xliv.  8,  15—19 

9- Jet.  xliv.  \ — 15.  f  Jer.  xliv.  15. 


tliE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS  CONNECTED.  179 

from  them  a  declaration,  that  they  would  worship  the  Lord  no 
more,  but  would  go  on  in  their  idolatry  :  for  they  told  him, 
that  it  had  been  best  with  him,  when  they  practised  it  in  Judah 
and  Jerusalem;  that  it  was  since  their  leaving  it  off,  that  all 
their  calamities  had  happened  unto  them  ;  and  that  therefore, 
they  would  no  more  hearken  unto  any  thing  that  he  should 
deliver  unto  them  in  the  name  of  the  Lord.s  Whereon  the 
word  of  the  Lord  came  unto  the  prophet,  denouncing  utter 
destruction  unto  them  by  the  sword,  and  by  the  famine, 
that  thereby  all  of  them,  that  is,  all  the  men  of  Judah  then 
dwelhng  in  Egypt,  should  be  consumed,  excepting  only  some 
few,  who  should  make  their  escape  into  the  land  of  Judah-'' 
And,  for  a  sign  hereof,  it  was  foretold  unto  them  by  the  same 
prophet,  that  Pharaoh  Hophra,  king  of  Egypt,  in  whom  they 
trusted,  should  be  given  into  the  hands  of  his  enemies,  who 
sought  his  life,  in  the  same  manner  as  Zedekiah  was  given 
into  the  hands  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  that  sought  his  life  ;  that 
so,  when  this  should  be  brought  to  pass  in  their  eyes,  they 
might  be  assured  thereby,  that  all  these  words,  which  the 
Lord  hath  spoken  against  them,  should  certainly  be  fulfilled 
upon  them  ;  as  accordingly  they  were  about  eighteen  years 
afterward. 

After  this  there  is  no  more  mention  of  Jeremiah.  It  is 
most  likely  that  he  died  in  Egypt  soon  after,  he  being  then 
much  advanced  in  years,  (for  he  had  now  prophesied  forty- 
one  years  from  the  thirteenth  of  Josiah,)  and  also  much  bro- 
ken (as  we  may  well  suppose)  by  the  calamities  which  hap- 
pened to  himself  and  his  country.  Tertullian,  Epiphanius, 
Dorotheus,  Jerome,  and  Zonaras,  tell  us,  that  he  was  stoned 
to  death  by  the  Jews,  for  preaching  against  their  idolatry. 
And  of  this  some  interpret  St.  Paul's  i>ii6i!i<76iic-civ  (?.  e.  they 
were  stoned,)  Heb.  xi.  37,  but  others  say,  that  he  was  put 
to  death  by  Pharaoh  Hophra,  because  of  his  prophecy  against 
him.  But  these  seem  to  be  traditions,  founded  rather  on 
conjecture  than  on  any  certain  account  of  the  matter. 

Nebuchadnezzar,  being  returned  to  Babylon  after  the  end 
of  the  Jewish  war,  and  the  full  settling  of  his  affairs  in  Syria 
and  Palestine,  did,  out  of  the  spoils  which  he  had  taken  in 
that  expedition,'  make  that  golden  image  to  the  honour  of 
Bel  his  god,  which  he  did  set  up,  and  dedicate  to  him  in  the 
plain  of  Dura:  the  history  of  which  is  at  large  related  in 

g  Jer.  xliv.  16—19.  li  .Ter.  xliv.  26—30. 

i  In  the  Greek  version  of  Daniel,  chap.  iii.  1,  this  is  said  to  have  been 
done  in  the  18th  year  of  Nebuchadnezzar.  But  this  is  not  in  (he  original 
text ;  for  in  that  no  year  at  all  is  mentioned  ;  and  therefore  it  is  most  proba- 
ble it  crept  into  it  from  some  marginal  comment,  for  which,  I  doubt  not, 
there  was  some  very  good  authority.  For,  it  could  in  no  year  of  that  king's 
reign  fall  more  likely  ;  and  therefore  according  hereto  I^have  here  placed  it. 


180  <;«NNEXION  OF  THE  HISTOBY  OP  [I'ART  /. 

the  third  chapter  of  Daniel :  but  how  Daniel  escaped  the 
fiery  furnace,  which  his  three  friends  on  that  occasion  wero 
condemned  unto,  is  made  a  matter  of  inquir}'  by  some.  That 
he  did  not  fall  down  and  worship  the  idol,  is  most  certain; 
it  absolutely  disagreeing  with  the  character  of  that  holy  re- 
ligious man,  to  make  himself  guilty  of  so  high  an  otfence 
against  God,  as  such  a  compliance  would  have  amounted 
unto ;  either,  therefore,  he  was  absent,  or  else,  if  present, 
was  not  accused.  The  latter  seems  most  probable  ;  for 
Nebuchadnezzar,  having  summoned  all  his  prince*,  counsel- 
lors, governors,  captains,  and  all  other  his  officers  and  mi- 
nisters, to  be  present,  and  assisting  at  the  solemnity  of  this 
dedication,  it  is  not  likely  that  Daniel,  who  was  one  of  ihc 
chiefest  of  them,  should  be  allowed  to  be  absent.  That  he 
was  present,  therefore,  seems  most  probable :  but  his  enemies 
thought  it  fittest  not  to  begin  with  him,  because  of  the  great 
authority  he  had  with  the  king  ;  but  rather  to  fall  first  on  his 
three  friends,  and  thereby  pave  the  way  for  their  more  suc- 
cessful reaching  of  him  after  it.  But  what  was  in  the  inte- 
rim miraculously  done  in  their  case,  quashed  all  further  ac- 
cusation about  this  matter;  and  for  that  reason  it  was,  that 
Daniel  is  not  at  all  spoken  of  in  it. 

Nebuchadnezzar,  in  the  twenty-first  year  of  his  reign,  ac- 

cording  to  the  Jewish  account,  which  was  the  nine- 
Nfbu'chad-    tccnth  accordlng  to  the  Babylonish  account,  and  the 

second  from  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem,  came 
again  into  Syria  and  laid  siege  to  Tyre,''  Ithobal  being  then 
king  of  that  city;  which  found  him  hard  work  for  thirteen 
years  together,  it  being  so  long  before  he  could  make  him- 
self master  of  the  place  :  for  it  was  a  stiong  and  wealthy  city, 
which  had  never  as  yet  submitted  to  any  foreign  empire, 
and  was  of  great  fame  in  those  days  for  its  traffic  and  mer- 
chandise,' whereby  several  of  its  inhabitants  had  made  them- 
selves as  great  as  princes  in  riches  and  splendour.™  It  was 
built  by  the  Zidonians,,  two  hundred  and  forty  years  before 
the  building  of  the  temple  of  Solomon  at  Jerusalem  :°  for  Zi- 
don  being  then  conquered  and  taken  by  the  Philistines  of 
Askelon,  many  of  the  inhabitants  escaping  (hence  in  their 
ships,  built  Tyre;"  and  therefore  it  was  called  by  the  pro- 
phet Isaiah  the  daughter  of  Zidon  :?  but  it  soon  outgrew  its 
mother  in  largeness,  riches,  and  power,  and  was  thereby 
enabled  to  withstand  for  so  many  years  the  power  of  thi:* 
mighty  king,  to  whom  ail  the  east  had  then  submitted. 

k  Josephus  Antiq.  book  10,  chap.  II,  et  contra  Apionem,  lib.  1, 

1  Ezek.  xxvi.  k,  xxvii.  m  Isa.  xxiii.  8. 

n  Josephus  Antiq.  b.  8.  c.  ^,  o  Justin,  lib.  IS,  c.  3. 

p  ha.,  xxiii.  12. 


JJOOK  II.]  THE  OLD  AND    NEW  TESTAMENTS.  181 

While  Nebuchadnezzar  lay  at  this  siege,  Nebuzaradan, 
the  captain  of  his  guards,  being  sent  out  by  him  with  ^^  ^^^ 
part  of  his  army,  invaded  the  land  of  Israel,  to  take  Nebucbad- 
revenge,  as  it  may  be  supposed,  for  the  death  of  Ge- 
daliah,  there  being  no  other  reason  why  he  should  fall  on 
the  poor  remains  of  those  mis£rable  people,  whom  he  him- 
self had  left  and  settled  there.  In  which  expedition  Nebu- 
zaradan, seizing  upon  all  of  the  race  of  Israel  that  he  could 
meet  with  in  the  land,  made  them  all  captives,  and  sent 
them  to  Babylon.i  But  they  all  amounted  to  no  more  than 
seven  hundred.and  forty-five  persons,  the  rest  having  all  fled 
into  Egypt,  as  hath  been  before  related. 

By  this  last  captivity  was  fully  completed  the  desolation 
of  the  land,  no  more  of  its  former  inhabitants  being  now  left 
therein.     And  hereby  were  also  completed   the   prophecies 
of  Isaiah,  Jeremiah,   Ezekiel,  and  other  prophets   relating 
hereto  ;  and  particularly  that  of  Ezekiel,""  wherein  God's 
forbearance  of  the  house  of  Israel  is  limited  to  three  hun- 
dred and  ninety  days,  and  his  forbearance  of  the  house  of 
Judah  to  forty  days.     For,  taking  the  days   for   years,  ac- 
cording to  the  prophetic  style  of  Scripture,  from  the  apos- 
tacy  of  Jeroboam  to  the  time  of  this  last  captivity,  there  will 
be  just  three  hundred  and  ninety  years  ;  and  so  long  God 
bore  the  idolatry  of  the  house  of  Israel ;  and  from  the  eigh- 
teenth year  of  Josiah,*  when  the  house  of  Judah  entered 
into  covenant  with  God  to  walk  wholly  in  his  ways,  to  the 
same  time  will  be  just  forty  years;  and  so  long  God   bore 
their  walking  contrary  to  that  covenant.     But  now  the  sta- 
ted time  of  his  forbearance,  in  respect  of  both  being  fully 
completed,  he  completed  also  the  desolation  of  both  in  this 
last  captivity,  in   which   both   had   an  equal  share,  part  of 
them,  who  were  now  carried  away,  being  of  the  house  of 
Judah,  and  part  of  the  house  of  Israel.     There  are  others 
who  end  both  the  computations  at  the  destruction  of  Jeru- 
salem ;  and,  to  make  their  hypothesis  good,  they  begin  the 
forty  years. of  God's  forbearance  of  the  house  of  Judah  from 
the  mission  of  the  prophet  Jeremiah  to  preach  repentance 
unto  them,  that  is,  from  the  thirteenth  of  Josiah,*^  when  he 
was  first  called  to  this  ollice  ;  from   which  time,  to  the  last 
year  of  Zedekiah,  when  Jerusalem  was  dt;stroyed,  were  ex- 
actly forty  years.     And  as  to  the  three  hundred  and  ninety 
years  forbearance  of  the  house  of  Israel,   according'  as  they 
compute  the  time  from  Jeroboam's  apostacy,  they  make  this 
period  to  fall  exactly  right  also,  that  is,  (o  contain  just  three 
hundred  and  ninety  years  from  that  time  to  the  destruction 

q  Jer.  lii.  30.  r  Ezek.  iv.  1—8. 

s  2  Chron.  xxxiv.  29—31.  t,  Jer.  i.  2. 


182  GJ3NNEX.I0N  OR  THE  HISTORY   OP  [pART  I. 

of  Jerusalem.  But  this  period  relating  purely  to  the  house 
of  Israel,  as  contradistinct  from  the  house  of  Judah,  in  this 
prophecy,  it  cannot  be  well  interpreted  to  end  in  the  de- 
struction of  Jerusalem,  in  which  the  house  of  Israel  had  no 
Concern  :  for  Jerusaleiu  was  not  within  the  kingdom  of  Is- 
rael, but  within  the  kingdom  jof  Judah,  of  which  it  was  the 
metropolis;  and  therefore  the  latter  only,  and  not  the  for- 
mer, had  their  punishment  in  it.  But  this  last  equally  af- 
fected both  ;  and  therefore  here  may  well  be  ended  the 
reckoning  which  belonged  to  both.  As  to  the  computing  of 
the  forty  years  of  God's  forbearance  of  the  house  of  Judah 
from  the  mission  of  Jeremiah  to  preach  repentance  unto 
them,  it  must  be  acknowledged,  that  from  thence  to  the  de- 
struction of  Jerusalem,  the  number  of  years  fails  exactly 
right ;  and  therefore,  since  the  one  hundred  and  twenty 
years  of  God's  forbearance  of  the  old  world  is  reckoned 
from  the  like  mission  of  Noah  to  preach  repentance  unto 
them,"  I  should  be  inclined  to  come  into  this  opinion,  and 
reckon  the  forty  years  of  this  forbearance  of  Judah  by  the 
forty  years  of  Jeremiah's  like  preaching  of  repentance  unto 
them ;  but  it  cannot  be  conceived,  why  Ezekicl  should 
reckon  the  time  of  his  mission  by  an  era  from  the  eighteenth 
year  of  Josiah  (for  the  thirtieth  year  on  which  he  saith  he  was 
called  to  the  prophetic  office  is  certainly  to  be  reckoned  from 
thence,)  unless  it  be  with  respect  to  the  forty  years  of  God's 
forbearance  of  the  house  of  Judah  in  his  own  prophecies. 

After  this,  Nuebzaradan  marched  against  the  Ammonites  ]^ 
and,  having  destroyed  Rabbah,  their  royal  city,  and  by  fire 
and  sword  made  great  desolation  in  that  country,  he  carried 
their  king,  and  their  princes,  and  most  of  the  chief  of  the 
land  into  captivity:  and  this  was  done  by  way  of  just  re- 
venge for  the  part  which  they  had  in  the  murder  of  Geda- 
liah,  the  king  of  Babylon's  governor  in  the  land  of  Israel. 

And,  during  this  siege  of  Tyre,  the  other  neighbouring 
nations,  that  is,  the  Philistines,  the  Moabites,  the  Edomites, 
and  the  Zidonians,  seem  also  to  have  been  harassed  and 
broken  by  the  excursions  of  the  Babylonians,  and  to  have 
had  all  those  judgments  executed  upon  them  which  we  find 
in  the  prophecies  of  Jeremiah^  and  Ezekiel,'^  to  have  been 
denounced  against  them. 

In  the  fourteenth  year  after  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem, 

An  574   ^^^'ch  ^^^  ^^^^  twenty-fifth  year  of  the  captivity  of  Je- 

Nebucbad-hoiachin,  were  revealed  unto  the  prophet  Ezekiel  al! 

.  jj^Qgg  visions  and  prophecies  concerning  the  future 

state  of  the  church  of  God,  which  we  have  from  the  fortieth 

chapter  of  his  prophecies  to  the  end  of  that  book. 

u  Gen.  vi.  3.  x  Jer.  xlix.  1— Q.  Ezek.  xxv,  1—7.  Amos  i.  14, 15. 

V  Jer.  55vii.  xxvlii.  jixix-  y-  Ezek.  xxv. 


UOOIi  n.j  THE  OLD  AKD  NEW  TESTAMENTS*  ISj 

This  same  year,  the  judgments  which  God  had  denoun- 
ced, by  the  mouth  of  his  prophets,  against  Pharaoh  Hophra, 
or  Apries,  king  of  Egypt,  began  to  operate  against  him.  For 
the  Cyrenians,*  a  colony  of  the  Greeks,  that  had  settled  in 
Africa,  having  taken  from  the  Lybians  (a  neighbouring  na- 
tion, lying  between  them  and  the  Egyptians,  and  bordering 
upon  both,  a  great  part  of  their  land,)  and  divided  it  among 
themselves,  the  Lybians  made  a  surrender  both  of  them.- 
selves  and  their  country  into  the  hands  of  Apries,  to  obtain 
his  protection.  Hereon  Apries  sent  a  great  army  into  Ly- 
bia,  to  wage  war  against  the  Cyrenians ;  which,  having  the 
misfortune  to  be  beaten  and  overthrown  in  battle,  were  al- 
most all  cut  off  and  destroyed,  so  that  very  few  of  them  es- 
caped the  carnage,  and  returned  again  into  Egypt  :  whereon 
the  Egyptians,  entertaining  an  opinion,  that  this  army  was 
sent  by  Apries  into  Lybia  on  purpose  to  be  destroyed,  that 
he  might,  when  rid  of  them,  with  the  more  ease  and  security 
govern  the  rest,  became  so  incensed  against  him,  that  a 
great  many  of  them,  embodying  together,  revolted  from 
him.  Apries,  hearing  of  this,  sent  Amasis,  an  officer  of  his 
court,  to  appease  them,  and  reduce  them  again  to  their  duty. 
But,  while  he  was  speaking  to  them,  they  put  on  his  head 
the  ensigns  of  royalty,  and  declared  him  their  king;  which 
he  accepting  of  staid  among  them,  and  increased  the  revolt. 
At  which  Apries,  being  much  incensed,  sent  Paterbemis,. 
another  officer  of  his  court,  and  one  of  the  first  rank  among 
his  followers,  to  arrest  Amasis  and  bring  him  unto  him  ; 
which  he  not  being  able  to  effect,  in  the  midst  of  so  great 
an  army  of  conspirators  as  he  found  about  him,  was,  on  his 
return,  very  cruelly  and  unworthily  treated  by  Apries  ;  for, 
out  of  anger  for  his  not  effecting  that  for  which  he  sent  him, 
though  he  had  no  power  to  accomplish  it,  he  outrageously 
commanded  his  ears  and  his  nose  to  be  immediately  cut  off. 
Which  wrong  and  indignity  offered  to  a  person  of  his  cha- 
racter and  worth,  so  incensed  the  rest  of  the  Egyptians, 
that  they  almost  all  joined  with  the  conspirators  in  a  ge- 
neral revolt  from  him.  Whereon  Apries,  being  forced  to 
fly,  made  his  escape  into  the  Upper  Egypt,  towards  the  bor- 
ders of  Ethiopia ;  where  he  maintained  himself  for  some 
years,  while  Amasis  held  all  the  rest. 

But  while  this  was  doing  in  Egypt,  at  length,  in  the  twenty- 
sixth  year  of  the  captivity  of  Jehoiachin,^  which  was 
the  fifteenth  after  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem,  Ne-  „  f",?'! 

-         ,       J  /.   m  r  Nebuchad  • 

bucnadnezzar  made  himself  master  of  lyre,  after  anezzars?. 


a  Herodot.  lib.  2&.  4.    Diodorus  Siculus,.  lib.  1,  part  2. 
b  Ezek.  xxix.  17. 


184  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  ©F  [PART  S< 

siege  of  thirteen  years  cotitinuance,*^  and  utterly  destroyed 
the  place,  that  is,  the  city  which  was  on  the  continent ; 
the  ruins  of  which  were  afterward  called  Pa!a2  Tyrus,  or 
Old  Tyre.  But,  before  it  came  to  this  extremity,  the  inha- 
bitants had  removed  most  of  their  effects  into  an  island 
about  half  a  mile  distant  from  the  shore  and  there  built 
them  a  new  city.  And  therefore,  when  Nebuchadnezzar 
entered  that  which  he  had  so  long  besieged,  he  found  little 
there  wherewith  to  reward  his  soldiers  in  the  spoil  of  the 
place  which  they  had  so  long  laboured  to  take  ;  and  there- 
fore, wreaking  his  anger  upon  the  buildings,  and  the  few  in- 
habitants who  were  left  in  them,  he  razed  the  whole  town  to 
the  ground,  and  slew  all  he  found  therein.  After  this  it 
never  more  recovered  its  former  glory ;  but  the  city  on  the 
island  became  the  Tyre  that  was  afterward  so  famous  by  that 
name;  the  other  on  the  continent  never  rising  any  higher, 
than  to  become  a  village  by  the  name  of  Old  Tyre,  as  was 
before  said  :  that  it  was  this  Tyre  only  that  Nebuchadnez- 
zar besieged,  and  not  the  other  on  the  island,  appears  from 
the  description  of  the  siege  which  we  have  in  Ezekiel.** 
For  thereby  we  find,  that  Nebuchadnezzar  made  a  fort 
against  the  place,  and  cast  up  a  mount  against  it,  and  erect- 
ed engines  of  battery  to  break  down  its  walls,^  which  could 
not  be  said  of  the  Tyre  on  the  island  ;  for  that  was  all  sur- 
rounded by  the  sea.  And  that  he  also  took  and  utterly  de- 
stroyed that  city,  appears  likewise  from  the  writings  of  the 
same  prophet.^  But  that  the  city  on  the  island  then  esca- 
ped this  fate,  is  manifest  from  the  Phognician  histories  ;  for 
in  them,  after  the  death  of  Ithobal  (who  was  slain  in  the  con- 
clusion of  this  war,^)  we  are  told  that  Baal  succeeded  in  the 
kingdom,  and  reigned  ten  years,*"  and  that  after  him  succeed- 
ed several  temporary  magistrates,  one  after  another,  who,  by 
the  name  of  judges,  had  the  government  of  the  place.  It 
is  most  probable,  that,  after  Nebuchadnezzar  had  taken  and 
destroyed  the  old  town,  those  who  had  retired  into  the 
island  came  to  terms,  and  submitted  to  him  ;  and  that  there- 
on Baal  was  deputed  to  be  their  king  under  him,  and  reigned 
ten  years :  that,  at  the  end  of  the  said  ten  years  (which  hap- 
pened in  the  very  year  that  Nebuchadnezzar  was  again  re- 
stored after  his  distraction.)  Baal  being  then  dead  or  deposed, 
the  government,  to  make  it  the  more  dependent  on  the  Ba- 
bylonians, was  changed  into  that  of  temporary  magistrates ; 
who,  instead  of  the  name  of  kings,  had  only  that  of  suffetes, 

c  Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  11^  et  contra  Apionem,  lib.  1. 
d  Ezek.  xxvi.  S.  e  Ezek.  xxvi.  9. 

f  Ezek.  xxvi.  4 ;  &  9—12.  g  Ezek.  xxviii,  8—10, 

h  Josephus  contra  Apionem,  lib.  1 


BOOK  n.j  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  'TESTAMENTS;  185 

or  judges,  given  unto  then^ ;  wliich  was  a  name  well  known 
among  the  Carthaginians,  who  were  descended  of  the  Tyri- 
ans  ;    for  so  their  chief  magistrates  were  called.'     It  had  its 
derivation  from  the  Hebrew  word  Shophetim,  i.  e.  judges, 
which  was  the  very  name  whereby  the  chief  governors  of 
Israel  were  called  for  several  generations,  before  they  had 
kings.     And  under  this  sort  of  government  the  Tyrians  seem 
to  have  continued  for  several  years  after,  till  they  were  re- 
stored to  their   former  state  by  Darius  Hystaspes  seventy 
years  after  ;  as  will,  in  its  proper  place,  be  hereafter  related. 
And  here  I  cannot  but  observe,  how  exactly  the  chrono- 
logy of  the  Phoenician  annals  agreeth  with  that  of  the  holy 
Scriptures.     Ezekiel  placeth  the  taking  of  Tyre  by  Nebu- 
chadnezzar in  the  twenty-sixth  year  of  the  captivity  of  Jeho- 
iachin.     For,  in  the  first  month,  and  in  the  first  day  of  the 
month,  of  the  twenty-seventh  year,  he  speaketh  (chap.  xxix. 
17,  18,  &;c.)of  that  city  as  newly  taken  by  Nebuchadnezzar, 
and  therefore,  the   taking  of  it  must  have  been  in  the  year 
before,  that   is,  in  the  twenty-sixth   of  the  said  captivity. 
This  fell  in  the  thirty-second  year  of  the  reign  of  Nebuchad- 
nezzar,*^ according  to  the  Babylonish  account ;    from  which 
year,  according  to  Ptolemy's  canon,  the  first  year  of  Cyrus 
at  Babylon  will  be  the  thirty-sixth,  and  so,  according  to  the 
Phoenician  annals,  will  it  be  exactly  the  same.     For,  accord- 
ing to  them,'  after  the  taking  of  Tyre  by  Nebuchadnezzar, 
Baal  had  the  government  of  it  ten  years,  and  Ecnibal  two 
months,  Chalbes  ten  months,  Abbar  three  months,  Mitgonus 
and  Jerastratus  six  years,  Balator  one  year,  Merball  four 
years,  and  Hirom  twenty  years,  in  whose  fourteenth  year, 
say  the  same  annals,  Cyrus  began  his  empire.     And,  putting 
all  these  together,  the  fourteenth  of  Hirom  will  be  exactly 
the  thirty-sixth  year  from  the  thirty-second  of  Nebuchad- 
nezzar, which  was  the  twenty-sixth  of  the  captivity  of  Je- 
hoiachin,  the  year,  according  to  Ezekiel,  in  which  Tyre  was 
taken.     And  therefore,  it  doth  hereby  appear,  that  the  said 
Phoenician  annals  place  the  taking  of  Tyre  in  the  very  same 
year  that  Ezekiel  doth  ;   for  the  twenty-sixth  year  from  the 
captivity  of  Jehoiachin  computed  downward,  in  which  Eze- 
kiel placeth  it,  and  the  thirty-sixth  year  from  the  fourteenth 

i  Livius,  lib.  28.  Suffeles  eorum  qui  sumtnus  est  ptznis  magistratus.  Vide 
etiam  ejusdem  lib.  30,  et  lib.  34,  ubi  de  suffetibus  ut  de  summo  apud  Car- 
(haginiensis  magistratu  mentio  fit. 

k  For  the  thirty-seventh  year  of  the  captivity*  of  Jehoiachin  being  the  last 
(which  was  the  forty-third)  year  of  the  reign  of  Nebuchadnezzar  (2  Kings 
XXV.  27 ;  &.  Jer.  lii.  31,)  the  twenty-sixth  year  of  the  said  captivity  must  w 
In  the  thirty-second  of  Nebuchadnezzar. 

i  JosejJhus  contra  Apionein,li!>.  I 

VoT..  I.  24 


186  CONNEXION   OP  THE  HlSTOllV    OF  [pART  I* 

©f  Hirom  computed  upward,  in  which  the  Phoenician  annals 
place  it,  will  be  exactly  the  same  year. 

Nebuchadnezzar  and  his  army  having  served  so  long  be- 
fore Tyre,  "till  every  head  was  bald,  and  every  shoulder 
peeled"™  through  the  length  and  hardships  of  the  war,  and 
gotten  little  on  the  taking  of  the  place  to  reward  him  and 
his  army  for  their  service  in  executing  the  wrath  of  God 
upon  the  place,  by  reason  that  the  Tyrians  had  saved  the 
best  of  their  effects  in  the  island  ;  God  did,  by  the  prophet 
Ezekiel,  promise  them  the  spoils  of  Egypt.  And  accord- 
ingly, this  very  same  year,  immediately  after  this  siege  was 
over,  iScbuchadnczzar,  taking  the  advantage  of  the  intestine 
divisions  which  were  then  in  that  country,  by  reason  of  the 
revolt  of  Amasis,  marched  with  his  army  thither,  and  over- 
running the  whole  land,  from  Migdol,"  or  Magdolum  (which 
is  at  the  first  entering  into  Egypt,)  even  to  Syene  (which  is 
at  the  farthest  end  of  it  towards  the  borders  of  Ethiopia,) 
he  made  a  miserable  ravage  and  devastation  therein,"  slaying 
multitudes  of  the  inhabitants,  and  reducing  a  great  part  of 
the  country  to  such  a  desolation,  as  it  did  not  recover  from 
in  forty  years  after.''  After  this  Nebuchadnezzar  having 
loaded  himself  and  his  army  with  the  rich  spoils  of  this 
country,  and  brought  it  all  in  subjection  to  him,  he  came  to 
terms  with  Amasis;  and  having  confirmed  him  in  the  king- 
dom, as  his  deputy,  returned  to  Babylon. 

During  this  ravage  of  the  land  of  Egypt  by  the  Babylo- 
nians, most  of  the  Jews,  who  had  fled  thither  after  the  mur- 
der of  Gedaliah,  fell  into  their  hands.*^  Many  of  them  they 
slew ',  others  they  carried  captive  with  them  to  Babylon. 
The  few  that  escaped  saved  themselves  by  flying  out  of 
Egypt,  and  afterward  settled  again  in  their  own  land  at  the 
end  of  the  captivity. 

After  Nebuchadnezzar  was  gone  out  of  Egypt,  Apries, 
creeping  out  of  liis  hiding-places,  got  towards  the 
An.sTo.  sea-coasts,  most  likely  into  the  parts  of  Lybia  ;  and 
nezz"a*r  35.  there,  hiring  an  army  of  Carians,  lonians,  and  other 
foreigners, ■■  marched  against  Amasis,  and  gave  him 
battle  near  the  city  of  Blemphis  ;  in  which  being  vanquished 
and  taken  prisoner,  he  was  carried  to  the  city  of  Sais,  and 

mEzek.  xxix.  18— 20;  &  xsx.  1—19. 

n  Ezek.  xxx.  6.  Where  observe  this  passage  (from  the  tower  of  Syene) 
in  the  English  translation  of  the  Bible,  is  wrong  translated.  For  the  Hebrew 
word  Migdol,  which  is  there  translated  tower,  is  the  name  of  the  city  Mag- 
dolum, which  was  at  the  entrance  of  Egypt  from  Palestine,  i.  e.  at  the  hither 
end  of  Egypt ;  whereas  Syene  was  at  the  other  end,  upon  the  borders  of 
Ethiopia,  the  translation  ought  to  be  thus  (from  Migdol  to  Syene)  that  is, 
from  one  end  of  Egypt  to  the  other. 

o  Ezek.  xsix.  30^—32.  p  Ezek.  xxix.  13. 

<j^Jer.  sliv.  27.  28^  r  Herod.  lib,  2,  PIo<J(3rus  Slcutus,  lib.  1,  part  2, 


BOOK  n.]     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  1^7 

there  strangled  in  his  own  palace.  And  hereby  were  com*- 
pleted  all  the  prophecies  of  the  prophets  Jeremiah''  and 
Ezekiel,^  which  they  had  foretold  both  concerning  him  and 
his  people  ;  especially  that  of  Jeremiah,  relating  to  his 
death,  whereby  it  was  foreshown,  "That  God  would  give 
Pharaoh  Hophra,  king  of  Egypt,  into  the  hands  of  his  ene- 
mies, and  into  the  hands  of  them  that  sought  his  life,  as  he 
gave  Zedekiah,  king  of  Judah,  into  the  hand  of  Nebuchad- 
nezzar, his  enemy,  that  sought  his  life  :""  which  was  exactly 
fulfilled  on  his  being  taken  prisoner,  and  executed  by  Amasis 
in  the  manner  as  I  have  said.  It  is  remarked  of  him  by 
Herodotus,^  that  he  was  of  that  pride  and  high  conceit  of 
himself,  as  to  vaunt,  that  it  was  not  in  the  power  of  God 
himself  to  dispossess  him  of  his  kingdom,  so  surely  he  thought 
himself  established  in  it;  and  agreeably  hereto  is  it,  that  the 
prophet  Ezekiel  chargeth  him  with  saying,  "  The  river  is 
mine,  and  I  have  made  it.">'  For  the  first  twenty  years  of 
his  reign,  he  had  enjoyed  as  prosperous  a  fortune  as  most  of 
his  predecessors,  having  had  many  successes  against  the 
Cypriots,  the  Zidonians,  the  Philistines,  and  other  nations  f 
but  after  he  took  on  himself,  Caligula  like,  to  be  thought  as 
a  god,  he  fell,  from  his  former  state,  and  made  that  miserable 
exit  which  I  have  related.  After  his  death,  Amasis,"*  without 
any  farther  opposition,  became  possessed  of  the  whole  king- 
dom of  Egypt,  and  held  it  from  the  death  of  Apries  forty- 
four  years.  This  happened  in  the  nineteenth  year  after  the 
destruction  of  Jerusalem. 

in  the  same  nineteenth  year,  Nebuchadnezzar  being  re- 
turned from  this  Egyptian  expedition  to  Babylon,  had  there 
the  dream  of  the  wonderful  great  tree,  and  the  cutting  down 
thereof;  of  which,  and  the  interpretation  of  it,  there  is  a 
full  account  in  the  fourth  chapter  of  Daniel. 

Nebuchadnezzar  being  now  at  rest  from  ail  his  wars,  and 
in  full  peace  at  home,  applied  himself  to  the  finishing  of  his 
buildings  at  Babylon.  Semiramis^  is  said  by  some,  and  Be- 
lus*^  by  others,  to  have  first  founded  this  city.  But  by  whom- 
soever it  was  first  founded,  it  was  Nebuchadnezzar  that 
made  it  one  of  the  wonders  of  the  world.  The  most  famous 
works  therein'' were,   1st,  the   walls  of  the  city;  2dly,   the 

s^Chap.  xliii.  xliv.  xlv.        t  Chap.  xxix.  xxx.  xxxi.  xxxii.      u  Jer.  xliv.  30. 

X  Herodotus,  lib,  2.  y  Ezek.  xxix.  9. 

z  Herodotus,  lib.  2.    Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  1,  part  2.    Jer.  xlvii.  1. 

a  Herodotus,  ibid.    Diodorus,  ibid. 

b  Herodotus,  lib.  1.     Ctesias,  .Tustin,  lib.  1,  c.  2. 

c  Q.  Curtius,  lib.  5,  c.  1.  Abydenus  ex  Megasthene  apud  Euseb.  Pr«p, 
Evang.  lib. 

d  Berosus  apud  Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c,  11.  Abydenus  apUd  Eu^eb. 
Praep.  Evang.  lib.  9. 


19^  COKIfEXION    OF  THE    BISTORV  OF  [fART  1. 

temple  of  Belus ;  Sdly,  his  palace,  and  the  hanging  gardens 
in  it ;  4thly,  the  banks  of  the  river  ;  and  othly,  the  artificial 
lake,  and  artificial  canals  made  for  (he  draining  of  that  river. 
In  the  magnificence  and  expense  of  which  works  he  much 
exceeded  whatsoever  had  been  done  by  any  king  before  him. 
And,  excepting  the  walls  of  China,  nothing  like  it  hath  lieen 
since  attempted,  whereby  any  one  else  can  be  equalled  to 
him  herein. 

1st,  The  walls  were  every  way  prodigious  :  for  they  were 
in  thickness  eighty-seven  feet,  in  height  three  hundred  and 
fifty  feet,  and  in  compass  four  hundred  and  eighty  furlongs, 
which  make  sixty  of  our  miles. ^  This  is  Ilerodotus's  ac- 
count of  them,  who  was  himself  at  Bab}  Ion,  and  is  the  most 
.ancient  author  that  hath  wrote  of  thi^  matter.  And  although 
there  are  others  that  differ  from  him  lierein.  yet  the  most 
that  agree  in  any  measures  of  those  walls  give  us  the  same, 
or  very  near  the  same,  he  doth.^  Those  who  lay  the  height 
of  them  at  fifty  cubits,  speak  of  them  only  as  they  were  af- 
ter the  time  of  Darius  Hystaspes  :  for  the  Babylonians  hav- 
ing revolted  from  him,  and,  in  confidence  of  their  strong 
walls,  stood  out  against  him  in  a  long  siege,  after  he  had  ta- 
ken the  place,  to  prevent  (heir  rebellion  for4hc  future,  he 
took  away  their  gates,  and  beat  down  the  walls  to  the  height 
last  mentioned  ;  and  beyond  this  they  were  never  after 
raised.  These  walls  were  drawn  round  the  city  in  the  form 
of  an  exact  square,^  each  side  of  which  was  one  hundred  and 
twenty  furlongs,  or  fifteen  miles  in  length,  and  all  built  of 
large  bricks,*'  cemented  together  with  bitumen,  a  glutinous 
slime  arising  out  of  the  earth  in  that  country,  which  binds  in 
building  much  stronger  and  firmer  than  lime,  and  soon  grows 
much  harder  than  the  brick  or  stones  themselves  which  it 
cements  together.  These  walls  were  surrounded  on  (he 
outside  with  a  vast  ditch  filled  with  water,  and  lined  with 
bricks  on  both  sides,  after  the  manner  of  a  scarp  or  counter- 
scarp, and  the  earth  which  was  dug  out  of  it,  made  the 
bricks,  wherewith  the  walls  were  built  ;  and  therefore,  from 
the  vast  height  and  breadth  of  the  walls  may  be  inferred  the 
greatness  of  the  ditch.  In  every  side  of  this  great  square 
were  twenty-five  gates,  that  is,  an  hundred  in  all,  which 
were  all  made  of  solid  brass  ;  and  hence  if  is,  that  when 
God  promised  to  Cyrus  the  conquest  of  Babylon,  he  tells 
him,  "  that  he  would  break  in  pieces  before  him  the  gates 
of  brass,"  (Isa.  xlv.  2.)     Between  every  two  of  these  gates, 

e  Herod,  lib.  1. 

f  Plinius,  lib.  6,  c.  26.  Philostratus,  lib.  1,  c.  IS.         g  Herod.  lib.  3. 
h  Herodotus,  liij.  1.    Q.  Curtius,  lib.  o,  c.  1.     Strabo,  lib.  16.     Dindoms 
iSituluf!;  lib.  ^      Arianus  dc  expeditiorx?  Afexandri.  lib.  7. 


1500K  II.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  189 

were  three  towers,  and  four  more  at  the  four  corners  of  this 
great  square,  and  three  between  each  of  these  corners  and 
the  next  gate  on  either  side  ;  and  every  one  of  these  towers 
was  ten  feet  higher  than  the  walls.  But  this  is  to  be  under- 
stood only  of  those  parts  of  the  wall  where  there  was  need 
of  towers:'  for  some  parts  of  them  lying  against  morasses  al- 
ways full  of  water,  where  they  couid  not  be  approached  by 
an  enemy,  they  had  there  no  need  o;  any  towers  at  all  for 
their  defence  ;  and  therefore  in  them  ihere  were  none  built ; 
for  the  whole  nu;nber  of  them  amounted  to  no  more  than 
two  hundred  and  tifty  ;  whereas,  had  the  same  uniform  or- 
der been  observed  in  their  disposition  all  round,  there  must 
have  been  many  more.  Frofn  the  twenty-five  gates  on  each 
side  of  this  great  square,  went  twenty-five  streets  in  straight 
lines  to  the  gates,  which  were  directly  over  against  them  in 
the  other  side  opposite  to  it.  So  that  the  whole  number  of 
the  streets  were  fifty,  each  fifteen  miles  long,  whereof  twen- 
ty-five went  one  way,  and  twenty-five  the  other,'^  directly 
crossing  each  other  at  right  angles.  And  besides  these, 
there  were  also  four  half  streets,  which  were  built  of  but 
one  side,  as  having  the  wall  on  the  other.  These  went  round 
the  four  sides  of  the  city  next  the  walls,  and  were  each 
of  them  two  hundred  feet  broad,'  and  the  rest  were  about 

i  Diodorus  Siculiis,  lib.  2. 
k  Herodotus,  lib.  1.  Much  according  to  tiiis  model  hath  William  Penn, 
the  Quaker,  laid  out  the  ground  for  his  city  of  Philadelphia,  in  Pennsylvania; 
and  were  it  all  built  according  to  that  design,  it  would  be  the  fairest  and 
host  city  in  all  America,  and  not  much  behind  any  other  in  the  whole  world. 
For  it  lieth  between  two  navigable  rivers,  at  the  distance  of  two  miles  from 
their  confluence,  and  consists  of  thirty  streets,  ten  of  which  being  drawn 
from  river  to  river  are  two  miles  long,  and  the  twenty  others  being  drawn 
cross  the  said  ten,  and  cutting  them  at  right  angles,  are  a  mile  long.  In  the 
midst  of  the  whole  is  left  a  square  often  acres,  and  in  the  middle  of  the  four 
quarters  of  the  town,  into  which  it  is  efjually  divided,  is  a  square  of  five 
acres  ;  which  void  places  are  designed  for  the  building  churches,  schools, 
and  other  public  buildings,  and  also  to  serve  for  the  inhabitants  lo  walk,  and 
otherwise  divert  themselves  in  them,  in  the  same  manner  as  Moorfields  do 
in  London.  Above  two  thousand  houses  are  in  this  place  already  built,  and 
when  it  shall  be  wholly  built  according  to  the  plan  above  mentioned,  it  will 
be  the  glory  of  that  part  of  the  world  ;  and  if  the  country  round  it  comes  to 
be  thoroughly  inhabited,  tiie  great  conveniency  of  its  situation  for  ti'ade  by 
reason  of  the  two  navigable  rivers  on  which  it  stands,  and  the  great  river 
Delaware,  into  which  both  fall  within  two  miles  of  it,  will  soon  draw  people 
enough  thither,  not  only  to  finish  the  scheme,  which  hath  been  laid  of  it  by 
its  first  founder,  but  also  to  enlarge  it  by  strcli  additions  on  each  side,  as  to 
make  its  breadth  answer  its  length  ;  and  then,  barring  the  walls  and  great- 
ness of  Babylon,  it  will  imitate  it  in  all  things  else,  and  in  tlie  conveniency 
of  its  situation  far  exceed  it.  But  this  is  to  be  understood  as  a  comparing  of 
a  small  thing  with  a  great.  For  though  Philadelphia  were  built  and  inhabi- 
ted to  the  utmost  I  have  mentioned,  that  is,  to  the  full  extent  of  two  miles  in 
breadth  as  well  as  in  length,  yet  fifty-six  of  such  cities  might  stand  within 
those  walls  that  encompassed  Babylon. 

1   Tiio  Plethra,  saith  Diodorus,  that  is,  two  hundred  feet,  for  a  plethrum 
contained  one  hundri.!  feet. 


iOO  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OP  [PART  I. 

one  hundred  and  fifty.  By  these  streets  thus  crossing 
each  other,  the  whole  city  was  cut  out  into  six  hundred  and 
seventy-six  squares,  each  of  which  was  four  furlongs  and  an 
half  on  every  side,  that  is,  two  miles  and  a  quarter  in  com- 
pass. Round  these  squares,  on  every  side,  towards  the 
streets  stood  the  houses,  all  built  three  or  four  stories  high, 
and  beautified™  with  all  manner  of  adornments  towards  the 
streets.  The  space  within,  in  the  middle  of  each  square, 
was  all  void  ground,^ employed  for  yards,  gardens,  and  other 
such  uses.  A  branch  of  ihe  river  Euphrates,  did  run  quite 
cross  the  city,  entering  in  on  the  north  side,  and  going  out  on 
the  south ;  over  which,  in  the  middle  of  the  city,  was  a 
bridge  of°  a  furlong  in  length,  and  thirty  feet  in  breadth, 
built  with"  wonderful  art,  to  supply  the  defect  of  a  founda- 
tion in  the  bottom  of  the  river,  which  was  all  sandy.  At  the 
two  ends  of  the  bridge  were  two  palaces,P  the  old  palace  on 
the  ^ast  side,  and  the  new  palace  on  the  west  side  of  the 
river ;  the  former  of  these  took  up  four  of  the  squares 
above  mentioned,*!  and  the  other  nine  of  them  ;'  and  the  tem- 
ple of  Belus,  which  stood  next  the  old  palace,  took  up  ano- 
ther of  these  squares.  The  whole  city  stood  on  a  large 
flat  or  plain,  in  a  very  fat  and  deep  soil.^  That  part  of  it 
which  was  on  the  east  side  of  the  river,  was  the  old  city  ; 
the  other  on  the  west  side  was  added  by  Nebuchadnezzar. 
Both  together  were  included  within  that  vast  square  1  have 
mentioned.  The  pattern  hereof  seemeth  to  have  been 
taken  from  Nineveh,  that  having  been  exactly  four  hun- 
dred and  eighty  furlongs  round  as  this  was."  For  Nebuchad- 
nezzar having,  in  conjunction  with  his  father,  destroyed  that 
old  royal  seat  of  the  Assyrian  empire,  resolved  to  make  this, 
which  he  intended  should  succeed  it  in  that  dignity,  alto- 
gether as  large  ;  only,  whereas  Nineveh  was  in  the  form 
of  a  parallelogram,*  he  made  Babylon  in  that  of  an  exact 
square  ;  which  figure  rendered  it  somewhat  the  larger  of  the 
two.  To  fill  this  great  and  large  city  with  inhabitants,  was 
the  reason  that  Nebuchadnezzar,  out  of  Judea  and  other 

m  Herodotus,  lib.  1.     Philostratus,  lib.  1. 

n  Strabo  saitli,  that  the  river  which  passed  through  Babylon,  was  a  furlong 
broad,  (lib.  ir»,j  but  Diodorus  saith,  (lib.  2,)  thai  the  bridge  was  five  furlongs 
long:  if  so,  it  must  be  much  longer  than  tiie  river  was  broad. 

o  Diodorus  Siculns,  lib.  2.  Q.  Curtius,  lib.  5,  c.  1.  Philostratus,  lib.  }. 
c.  18.     Herodotus,  lib.  1 

p  Berosus  apud  Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  10.  c.  11.  Herodotus,  lib.  1.  Diodor 
Sic.  lib.  2.     Q.  Curtius,  lib  5,  c.  1.     Philostrattis,  lib.  1,  c.  18. 

q  It  was  thirty  furlongs  in  compass      Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  2. 

r  It  was  sixty  furlongs  in  compass,  Diodorus  ibid. 

3  Herodotus,  lib.  1. 

t  Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  2.  u  Diodorus  ibid. 

X  Two  of  its  sides  were  each  one  hundred  and  fifty  fiilongs  long,  and  the 
/>ther  but  eighty  each.  Diodorus  ibid. 


L^OOK  n.]  THE  OLD  AXU  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  19 1 

conquered  countries,  carried  so  great  a  number  of  captives 
thither.  And  could  he  have  made  it  as  populous  as  it  was 
great,  there  was  no  country  in  all  the  east  could  better,  than 
that  in  which  it  stood,  have  maintained  so  great  a  number  of 
people,  as  must  then  have  been  in  it  :  for  the  fertility  of  this 
province  was  so  great, ^  that  it  yielded  to  the  Persian  kings 
during  their  reign  over  Asia,  half  as  much  as  did  all  that 
large  empire  besides  ;  the  common  return  of  their  tillage 
being  between  two  and  three  hundred  fold  every  crop.  But 
it  never  happened  to  have  been  fully  inhabited  j^  it  not 
having  had  time  enough  to  grow  up  thereto;  for,  within 
twenty-five  years  after  the  death  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  the 
royal  seat  of  the  empire  was  removed  from  thence  to  Shu- 
shan  by  Cyrus  ;  which  did  put  an  end  to  the  growing  glory 
of  Babylon  ;  for  after  that  it  never  more  flourished.  When 
Alexander  came  to  Babylon,  Curtius  tells  us,^  no  more  than 
ninety  furlongs  of  it  was  then  built ;  which  can  no  otherwise 
be  understood,  than  of  so  much  in  length;  and  if  we  allow 
the  breadth  to  be  as  much  as  the  length  (which  is  the  utmost 
that  can  be  allowed,)  it  will  follow,  that  no  more  than  eight 
thousand  one  hundred  square  furlongs  were  then  built  upon  ; 
but  the  whole  space  within  the  walls  contained  fourteen 
thousand  four  hundred  square  furlongs ;  and  therefore  there 
must  have  been  six  thousand  three  hundred  square  furlongs 
that  were  unbuilt,  which  Curtius^  tells  us  were  ploughed 
and  sown.  And,  besides  this,  the  houses  were  not  conti- 
guous, but  all  built  with  a  void  space  on  each  side  between 
house  and  house.  And  the  same  historian  tells  us,  this  was 
done  because  this  way  of  building  seemed  to  them  the  safe- 
cst.  His  words  are  :  Jlc  ne  totam  quidtm  urbem  tectis  occU' 
paverunt,  per  90  stadia,  habitatur ;  nee  omnia  continua  sunt, 
credo  quia  tulius  visum  est  pluribus  locis  spargi ;  i.  e.  '  Nei- 
ther was  the  whole  city  built  upon,  for  the  space  of  ninety 
furlongs  it  was  inhabited ;  but  the  houses  were  not  conti- 
guous, because  they  thought  it  safest  to  be  dispersed  in  many 
places  distant  from  each  other.'  Which  words,  (they  thought 
it  safest)  are  to  be  understood,  not  as  if  they  did  this  for  the 
better  securing  o^  their  houses  from  fire,  as  some  interpret 
them,  but  chiefly  for  the  better  preserving  of  health.  For 
hereby,  in  cities  situated  in  such  hot  countries,  those  sutFo- 
cations  and  other  inconveniences  are  avoided,  which  must 
necessarily  attend  such  as  (there)  dwell  in  houses  closely 
built  together.  For  which  reason  Delhi,  the  capital  of 
India,  and  several  other  cities  in  those  warmer  parts  of  the 
world,  are  thus  built ;  the  usage  of  those  places  being,  that 

▼  Herodotus,  lib.  1  z  Q.  Curtius,  lib.  6,  c.  1. 


192  CONxVEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OF  fpART  1. 

such  a  stated  space  of  ground  be  left  void  between  every 
house  and  house  that  is  built  in  them.  And  old  Rome  was 
built  after  the  same  manner.  So  that,  putting  all  this  toge- 
ther, it  will  appear,  that  Babylon  was  so  large  a  city,  rather 
in  scheme  than  in  reality.  For,  according  to  this  account, 
it  must  be  by  much  the  larger  part  that  was  never  built; 
and  therefore,  in  this  respect,  it  must  give  place  to  Nineveh, 
which  was  as  many  furlongs  in  circuit  as  the  other,  and  with- 
out any  void  ground  in  it  that  we  are  told  of.  And  the  num- 
ber of  its  infants  at  (he  same  time,  which  could  not  discern 
between  their  right-hand  and  their  left,  which  the  Scriptures 
tell  us  were  one  hundred  and  twenty  thousand,  in  the  time 
of  Jonah,  doth  sufliciently  prove  it  was  fully  inhabited.  Tt 
was  intended  indeed  that  Babylon  should  have  exceeded  it 
in  every  thing.  But  Nebuchadnezzar  did  not  live  long 
enough,  nor  the  Babylonish  empire  last  long  enough,  to  finish 
the  scheme  that  was  first  drawn  of  it. 

The  next  great  work  of  Nebuchadnezzar  at  Babylon  was 
the  temple  of  Belus.''  But  that  which  was  most  remarkable 
in  it,  was  none  of  his  work,  but  was  built  many  ages  before. 
It  was  a  wonderful  tower  that  stood  in  the  middle  of  it.  At 
the  foundation, **  it  was  a  square  of  a  furlong  on  each  side, 
that  is,  half  a  mile  in  the  whole  compass,  and  consisted  of 
eight  towers,  one  built  above  the  other.  Some  following  a 
mistake  of  the  Latin  version  of  Herodotus,  wherein  the 
lowest  of  these  towers  is  said  to  be  a  furlong  thick  and  a  fur- 
long high,  will  have  each  of  these  towers  to  have  been  a  fur- 
long high,  which  amounts  to  a  mile  in  the  whole.  But  the 
Greek  of  Herodotus,  which  is  the  authentic  text  of  that  au- 
thor, saith  no  such  thing,  but  only,  that  it  was  a  furlong  long, 
and  a  furlong  broad,  without  mentioning  any  thing  of  its 
height  at  all.  And  Strabo,  in  his  description  of  it,  calling  it 
a  pyramid,  because  of  its  decreasing  or  benching  in  at  every 
tower,  saith  of  the  whole,  that  it  was  a  furlong  high,  and  a 
furlong  on  every  side.*^  To  reckon  every  tower  a  furlong, 
and  the  whole  a  mile  high,  would  shock  any  man's  belief, 
were  the  authority  of  both  these  authors  for  it,  much  more 
when  there  is  none  at  all.  Taking  it  only  as  it  is  described 
by  Strabo,  it  was  prodigious  enough  :  for,  according  to  his 
dimensions  only,  without  adding  any  thing  farther,  it  was 
one  of  the  most  wonderful  works  in  the  world,  and  much  ex- 
ceeding the  greatest  of  the  pyramids  of  Egypt,  which  hath 
been  thought  to  excel  all  other  works  in  the  world  besides. 
For  although  it  fell  short  of  that  pyramid  at  the  basis ''  (where 

a  Berosus  apud  Josephum  Antiq.  lib.  10.  c.  11.  b  Herodot.  lib.  1. 

c  Strabo,  lib.  16. 

d  Pee  Mr.  Greave's  description  of  the  Pyramids,  p.  €8,  69. 


BOOK  II.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  193 

that  was  a  square  of  seven  hundred  feet  on  every  side,  and 
this  but  of  six  hundred,)  yet  it  far  exceeded  it  in  the  height; 
the  perpendicular  measure  of  the  said  pyramid  being  no 
more  than  four  hundred  and  eighty-one  feet,  whereas  that 
of  the  other  was  full  six  hundred  ;  and  therefore  it  was 
higher  than  that  pyramid  by  one  hundred  and  nineteen  feet, 
which  is  one  quarter  of  the  whole.  And  therefore  it  was  not 
without  reason,  that  Bochartus  asserts  it  to  have  been  the 
very  same  tower  which  was  there  built  at  the  confusion  of 
tongues. •*  For  it  was  prodigious  enough  to  answer  the 
Scriptures'  description  of  it;  and  it  is  particularly  attested 
by  several  authors  to  have  been  all  built  of  bricks  and 
bitumen,  as  the  Scriptures  tell  us  the  tower  of  Babel  was.^ 
Herodotus  saith,  that  the  going  up  to  it  was  by  stairs  on  the 
outside  round  it ;  from  whence  it  seems  most  likely,  that  the 
whole  ascent  to  it  was  by  the  benching-in  drawn  in  a  sloping 
line  from  the  bottom  to  the  top  eight  times  round  it ;  that  this 
made  the  appearance  of  eight  towers  one  above  another,  in 
the  same  manner  as  we  have  the  tower  of  Babel  commonly 
described  in  pictures ;  saving  only,  that  whereas  that  is 
usually  pictured  round,  this  was  square.  For  such  a  bench- 
ing in  drawn  in  a  slope  eight  times  round  in  manner  as  afore- 
said, would  make  the  whole  seem  on  every  side  as  consisting 
of  eight  towers,  and  the  upper  tower  to  be  so  much  less  than 
that  next  below  it,  as  the  breadth  of  the  benching  in  amount- 
ed to.  These  eight  towers  being  as  so  many  stories  one 
above  another,  were  each  of  them  seventy-five  feet  high,  and 
in  them  were  many  great  rooms  with  arched  roofs  supported 
hy  pillars.  All  which  were  made  parts  of  the  temple,  after 
the  tower  became  consecrated  to  that  idolatrous  use.  The 
uppermost  story  of  all  was  that  which  was  most  sacred,  and 
where  their  chiefest  devotions  were  performed.  Over  the 
whole,  on  the  top  of  the  tower,  was  an  observatory,  by  the 
benefit  of  which  it  was,  that  the  Babylonians  advanced  their 
skill  in  astronomy  beyond  all  other  nations,  and  came  to  so 
early  a  perfection  in  it,  as  is  related.^  For  when  Alexander 
took  Babylon,  Calisthenes  the  philosopher,  who  accompanied 
him  thither,  found  they  had  astronomical  observations  for 
nineteen  hundred  and  three  years  backwards  from  that  time : 
which  carrieth  up  the  account  as  high  as  the  one  hundred  and 
fifteenth  year  after  the  flood,  which  was  within  fifteen  years 
after  the  tower  of  Babel  was  built.  For  the  confusion  of 
tongues,  which  followed  immediately  after  the  building  of  that 

e  Phaleg.  part  1.  lib.  1.  c.  9. 

f  Strabo,  lib.  \6.  Herodotus,  lib.  1.   DiodoT.  Sin  Til).  2.  ArrJsti.  de  Kjfpfi" 
ditione  ^lexandri,  lib.  7. 
s;  Diodor.  Sic.  lib.  2-.  p.  98. 


194  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF-  [PAKT  1, 

tower,  happened  in  the  year  wherein  Peleg  was  born,  which 
was  one  hundred  and  one  years  after  the  flood,  and  fourteen 
years  after  that  these  observations  began.  This  account  Ca - 
listhenes  sent  from  Babylon  into  Greece,  to  his  master  Aris- 
totle ;  as  Symplicius,  from  the  authority  of  Porphyry,  deli- 
vers it  unto  us  in  his  second  book  De  Coelo.  Till  the  time 
of  Nebuchadnezzar,  the  temple  of  Belus  contained  no  more 
than  this  tower  only,  and  the  rooms  in  it  served  all  the  occa- 
sions of  that  idolatrous  worship.  But  he  enlarged  it,*"  by 
vast  buildings  erected  round  it,  in  a  square  of  two  furlongs 
on  every  side,  and  a  mile  in  circumference,'  which  was  eigh- 
teen hundred  feet  more  than  the  square  at  the  temple  of  Je- 
rusalem -.^  for  that  was  but  three  thousand  feet  round ;  whereas 
this  was,  according  to  this  account,  four  thousand  eight  hun- 
dred. And,  on  the  outside  of  all  these  buildings,  there  was  a 
wall  enclosing  the  whole,  which  may  be  supposed  to  have 
been  of  equal  extent  with  the  square  in  which  it  stood,  that 
is,  two  miles  and  an  half  in  compass  ;  in  which  were  several 
gates  leading  into  the  temple,  all  of  solid  brass  ;^  and  the 
brazen  sea,  the  brazen  pillars,  and  the  other  brazen  vessels 
which  were  carried  to  Babylon  from  the  temple  of  Jerusa- 
lem, seem  to  have  been  employed  in  the  making  of  them. 
For  it  is  said,  that  Nebuchadnezzar  did  put  all  the  sacred 
vessels,  which  he  carried  from  Jerusalem,  into  the  house  of 
his  god  at  Babylon,"*  that  is,  into  this  house  or  temple  of  Bel : 
for  that  was  the  name  of  the  great  god  of  the  Babylonians. 
He  is  supposed  to  have  been  the  same  with  Nimrod,  and  to 
have  been  called  Bel  from  his  dominion,  and  Nimrod  from  his 
rebellion  :  for  Bel,  or  Baal,  which  is  the  same  name,  signi- 
fieth  lord,  and  Nimrod,  a  rebel,  in  the  Jewish  and  Chaldean 
languages  :  the  former  was  his  Babylonish  name,  by  reason 
of  his  empire  in  that  place,  and  the  latter  his  Scripture  name, 
by  reason  of  his  rebellion,  in  revolting  from  God  to  follow 
his  own  wicked  designs.  This  temple  stood  till  the  time  of 
Xerxes:  but  he,  on  his  return  from  his  Grecian  expedition," 
demolished  the  whole  of  it,  and  laid  it  all  in  rubbish;  having 
first  plundered  it  of  all  its  immense  riches,  among  which 
were  several  images  or  statues  of  massy  gold,  and  one  of 
them  is  said,  by  Diodorus  Siculus,"  to  have  been  forty  feet 
high,  which  might  perchance  have  been  that  which  Nebu- 
chadnezzar consecrated  in  the  plains  of  Dura.    Nebuchad- 

h  Berosus  apud  Josephum  Antiq.  lib.  10.  c.  11.  i  Herodot.  lib.  1. 

k  For  it  was  a  square  of  five  hundred  cubits  on  every  side,  and  two  thou- 
sand in  the  whole,  i.  e.  three  thousand  feet.  See  Lightfoot's  description  of 
the  temple  of  Jerusalem. 

I  Herodotus,  lib.  1.  m  Dan.  i.  2.    2  Chron.  xsxvi.  7. 

n  Strabo,  lib.  16,  p.  73.8.  Herodot.  lib.  1.  Arrianusde  Expeditione  Ales* 
andrl.  lib.  7.  o  Lib.  2, 


HOOK  11,}  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  195 

nezzar's  golden  image  is  said  indeed  in  Scripture  to  have 
been  sixty  cubits,  i.  e.  ninety  feet  high :  but  that  must  be 
understood  of  the  image  and  pedestal  both  together:  for 
that  image  being  said  to  have  been  but  six  cubits  broad  or 
thick,  it  is  impossible  that  the  image  could  have  been  sixty 
cubits  high  ;  for  that  makes  its  height  to  be  ten  times  its 
breadth  or  thickness,  which  exceeds  all  the  proportions  of  a 
man,  no  man's  height  being  above  six  times  his  thickness, 
measuring  the  slenderest  man  living  at  his  v/aist.  But  where 
the  breadth  of  this  image  was  measured  is  not  said :  per- 
chance it  was  from  shoulder  to  shoulder ;  and  then  the 
proportion  of  six  cubits  breadth  will  bring  down  the  height 
exactly  to  the  measure  which  Diodorus  hath  mentioned  :  for 
the  usual  height  of  a  man  being  four  and  an  half  of  his 
breadth  between  the  shoulders,  if  the  image  were  six  cubits 
broad  between  the  shoulders,  it  must,  according  to  this  pro- 
portion, have  been  twent^'-seven  cubits  high,  which  is  forty 
and  an  half  feet.  Besides,  Diodorus  tells  us,p  that  this  image 
of  forty  feet  high,  contained  one  thousand  Babylonish  talents 
of  gold,  which  according  to  Pollux  (who,  in  his  Onomasticon, 
reckons  a  Babylonish  talent  to  contain  seven  thousand  Attic 
drachmas,  {.  e.  eight  hundred  and  seventy-five  ounces) 
amounts  to  three  millions  and  a  half  of  our  money. '^  But.  if 
we  advance  the  height  of  the  statue  to  ninety  feet  without 
the  pedestal,  it  will  increase  the  value  to  a  sum  incredible  ; 
and  therefore  it  is  necessary  to  take  the  pedestal  also  into  the 
height  mentioned  by  Daniel.  Other  images  and  sacred 
utensils  were  also  in  that  temple,  all  of  solid  gold.  Those 
that  are  particularly  mentioned  by  Diodorus  contain  five 
thousand  and  thirty  talents,  which,  with  the  one  thousand 
talents  in  the  image  above  mentioned,  amount  to  above  twen- 
ty-one millions  of  our  money.  And,  besides  this,  we  may 
well  suppose  the  value  of  as  much  more  in  treasure  and 
utensils  not  mentioned,  which  was  a  vast  sum.  But  it  was 
the  collection  of  near  two  thousand  years  ;  for  so  long  that 
temple  had  stood.  All  this  Xerxes  took  away,  when  he  de- 
stroyed it.  And  perchance  to  recruit  himself  with  the  plun- 
der, after  the  vast  expense  which  he  had  been  at  in  his 
Grecian  expedition,  was  that  which  chiefly  excited  him  to 
the  destruction  of  it,  what  other  reason  soever  might  bo  pre- 
tended for  it.  Alexander,  on  his  return  to  Babylon  from  his 
Indian  expedition,  purposed  again  to  have  rebuilt  it  -J  and, 

p  Lib.  2. 

q  This  is  according  to  the  lowest  computation,  valuing  an  Attic  drachm 
at  no  more  than  seven-pence  halfpenny,  whereas  Dr.  Bernard  reckons  it  to 
be  eight-pence  farthing,  which  would  amount  the  sum  much  higher. 

r  Strabo,  lib.  16.  Josephus  contra  Apionem,  lib.  1.  Arrianris  de  Expedi- 
tione  .\lexandrij  lib,  7. 


190  OOX.VEXrON  OK  a:HE  HISTORY  OJP  [L'ART  I. 

in  OFdcF  hereto,  he  did  set  ten  thousand  men  on  work  to  rid 
the  place  of  its  rubbish  :  but,  after  they  had  laboured  herein 
two  months,  Alexander  died,  before  they  had  perfected 
much  of  the  undertaking;  and  this  did  put  an  end  to  all  far- 
ther proceedings  in  that  design.  Had  he  hved,  and  made 
that  city  the  seat  of  his  empire,  as  it  was  supposed  he  would,^ 
the  glory  of  Babylon  would  no  doubt  have  been  advanced 
by  him  to  the  utmost  height  that  ever  Nebuchadnezzar  in- 
tended to  have  brought  it  to,  and  it  would  again  have  been 
the  queen  of  the  East. 

Next  tliis  temple,'  on  the  same  east  side  of  the  river,  stood 
the  old  palace  of  the  kings  of  Babylon,  being  four  miles  in 
compass.  Exactly  over  against  it,  on  the  other  side  of  the 
river,*  stood  the  new  palace  ;  and  this  was  that  which  Ne- 
buchadnezzar built. ^  It  was  four  times  as  big  as  the  former, 
as  being  eight  miles  in  compass. ^  It  was  surrounded  with 
three  walls  one  within  another,  and  strongly  fortitied,  accord- 
ing to  the  way  of  those  times.  But  what  was  most  wonder- 
ful in  it  wfere  the  hanging-gardens,  which  were  of  so  cele- 
brated a  name  among  the  Greeks.  They  contained  a 
square  of  four  plethra  (that  is,  of  four  hundred  feet)  on 
every  side,  and  were  carried  up  aloft  into  the  air,  in  the 
manner  of  several  large  terraces,  one  above  another,  till  the 
highest  equalled  the  height  of  the  walls  of  the  city.^  The 
ascent  was  from  terrace  to  terrace,  by  stairs  ten  feet  wide. 
The  whole  pile  was  sustained  by  vast  arches,  built  upon 
arches,  one  above  another,  and  strengthened  by  a  wall,  sur- 
rounding it  on  every  side,  of  twenty-two  feet  in  thickness. 
The  floors  of  every  one  of  these  terraces  were  laid  in  the 
same  manner  ;  which  was  thus ;  On  the  top  of  the  arches 
were  first  laid  large  flat  stones,  sixteen  feet  long,  and  four 
broad,  and  over  them  was  a  layer  of  reed,  mixed  with  a  great 
quantity  of  bitumen,  over  which  were  two  rows  of  bricks, 
closely  cemented  together  by  plaster,  and  then  over  all  were 
laid  thick  sheets  of  lead,  and,  lastly,  upon  the  lead  was  laid 
the  mould  of  the  garden  :  and  all  this  floorage  was  contrived 
to  keep  the  moisture  of  the  mould  from  running  away  down 
through  the  arches.  The  mould  or  earth  laid  hereon  was  of 
that  depth,  as  to  have  room  enough  for  the  greatest  trees  to 
take  rooting  in  it ;  and  such  were  planted  all  over  it  ifi  every 
terrace,  as  were  also  all  other  trees,  plants,  and  flowers,  ttint 
were  proper  for  a  garden  of  pleasure.     In  the  upper  ter- 

s  Strabo,  lib.  15.  p  731. 

t  Diodor.  Sic.  lib.  2.  Philostrat.  lib.  1.  c.  IS. 

X   Berosus  apiid  Joseph,  lib.  10,  c.  11. 

V  Diodor.  lib.  2.     Herod,  lib  1. 

■f  Viodor.  Sir.  lib.  2.     Strabo.  lib.  IR.     Q  rnrtln?,  lib.  3,  c,  J 


HOOK  IJ.j  THE  OLD  AND   NEW   TESTAMENTS.  197 

race  there  was  an  aqueduct  oi;  engine,  whereby  water  was 
drawn  up  out  of  the  river,  which  from  thence  watered  the 
whole  garden.  Amyitis,  the  wife  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  hav- 
ing been  bred  in  Media  (for  she  was  the  daughter  of  Asty- 
ages,  tlie  king  of  that  country,  as  hath  been  before  related,) 
had  been  much  taken  with  the  mountainous  and  woody  parts 
of  that  country,  and  therefore  desired  to  have  sometlsiiig  like 
it  at  Babylon:  and  to  gratify  her  herein  was  the  reason  of 
erecting  this  monstrous  work  of  vanity. 

The  other  works  attributed  to  him,  by  Berosus^  and 
Abydenus,**  were  the  banks  of  the  river,  and  the  artificial 
canals,  and  artificial  lake,  which  were  made  for  draining  of 
it  in  the  times  of  overflows  :  for,  on  the  coming  on  of  the 
summer,  the  sun  melting  the  snow  on  the  mountains  of  Ar- 
menia, from  thence  there  is  always  a  great  overflow  of  water 
during  the  months  of  June,  July,  and  August,  which,  run- 
ning into  the  Euphrates,  makes  it  overflow  all  its  banks  dur- 
ing that  season,  in  the  same  manner  as  doth  the  river  Nile  in 
Egypt  f  whereby  the  city  and  country  of  Babylon  suffering 
great  damage,  for  the  preventing  hereof,  he  did,  a  great 
way  up  the  stream,  cut  out  of  it,  on  the  east  side,  two  arti- 
ficial canals,  thereby  to  drain  off  these  overflowings  into  the 
Tigris,  before  they  should  reach  Babylon.*^  The  farthest  of 
these  was  the  current  which  did  run  into  the  Tigris  near 
Seleucia,  and  the  other  that  which,  taking  its  course  be- 
tween the  last  mentioned  and  Babylon,  discharged  itself  into 
the  same  river  over  against  Apamia  f  which  being  very  large, 
and  navigable  for  great  vessels,  was  from  thence  called  Na- 
harmalcha,  that  is,  in  the  Chaldean  language,  the  royal  river.^ 
This  is  said  to  have  been  made  by  Gobaris,^  or  Gobrias, 
who,  being  the  governor  of  the  province,  had  the  overseeing 
of  the  work  committed  to  his  care,  and  seemeth  to  have 
been  the  same  who  afterward,  on  a  great  wrong  done  him, 
revolted  from  the  Babylonians  to  Cyrus,  as  will  be  hereafter 
related.  And,  for  the  farther  securing  of  the  country,  Nebu- 
chadnezzar built  also  prodigious  banks  of  brick  and  bitu- 
men on  each  side  of  the  river,  to  keep  it  within  its  channel,'' 
which  were  carried  along  from  the  head  of  the  said  canals 
down  to  the  city,  and  some   way  below   it.'     But   the  most 

a  Apud  Joseph.  Antiq.  lib   10.  c   il.  el  contra  Apionera,  lib.  1. 

b  Apiid  Eusebium  Preepar.  Evang.  lib.  9. 

c  Strabo,  lib.  16.  Pliii.  lib.  5,  c.  26.  Arrianus  de  Expeditione  Alexandrlj 
lib.  7.    Q.  Curtins.  lib.  5,  c.  1. 

d  Abydeiuis  apud  Euseb.  Pra?p.  Evang.  lib.  9. 

e  Ptol.  lib.  5,  c.  18.  Plin.  lib.  5,  c.  26. 

f  Abydenus,  ibid.  Ptol.  ibid.  Plin.  lib.  6,  c.  26.  Polybius,  lib.  5.  Ammia- 
nus  Marcelliniis,  lib.  24.  Strabo,  lib.  16,  p.  747.  Isidorus  Characenusde 
Statlmiis  Partliicis.  g  Plin.  lib.  6.  c.  26  li  Abydenus,  ibid 

j  Herodotus,  lib.  1. 


i9y  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

wonderful  part  of  the  work  was  within  the  city  itself:  for 
there,''  on  each  side  of  the  river,  he  built  from  the  bottom 
of  it  a  great  wall  for  its  bank,  of  brick  and  bitumen,  which 
was  of  the  same  thickness  with  the  walls  of  the  city ;  and, 
over  against  every  street  that  crossed  the  said  river,  he  made, 
on  each  side  a  brazen  gate  in  the  said  wail,  and  stairs  lead- 
ing down  from  it  to  the  river,  from  whence  the  citizens 
used  to  pass  by  boat  from  one  side  to  the  other,  which  was 
the  only  passage  they  had  over  the  river,  till  the  bridge  was 
built  which  I  have  above  mentioned.  The  gates  were  open 
by  day,  but  always  shut  by  night.  And  this  prodigious  work' 
was  carried  on,  on  both  sides  of  the  river,  to  the  length  of 
one  hundred  and  sixty  furlongs,  which  is  twenty  miles  of  our 
measure  ;  and  therefore  must  have  been  begun  two  miles 
and  an  half  above  the  city,  and  continued  down  two  miles 
and  an  half  below  it  ;  for  through  the  city  was  no  more  than 
fifteen  miles.  While  these  banks  were  a  building  the  river 
was  turned  another  wa}  :  for  which  purpose,  to  the  west  of 
Babylon,™  was  made  a  prodigious  artificial  lake,  which  was, 
according  to  the  lowest  computation,  forty  miles  square, 
and  one  hundred  and  sixty  in  compass  ;  and  in  depth  thirty- 
live  feet,saith  Herodotus;"  seventy-five,  saith  Megasthenes* 
The  former  seems  to  measure  from  the  surface  of  the  sides, 
and  the  other  from  the  top  of  the  banks  that  were  cast  upon 
them.  And  into  this  lake  was  the  whole  river  turned  by  an 
artificial  canal  cut  from  the  west  side  of  it,  till  all  the  said 
work  was  finished,  and  then  it  was  returned  again  into  its 
own  former  channel.  But  that  the  said  river,  in  the  time  of 
its  increase,  might  not,  through  the  gates  above  mentioned 
overflow  the  city,  this  lake,  with  the  canal  leading  thereto, 
was  still  preserved,  and  proved  the  best  and  the  most  effec- 
tual means  to  prevent  it ;  for  whenever  the  river  rose  to  such 
an  height  as  to  endanger  this  overflowing,  it  always  dis- 
charged itself,  by  this  canal  into  the  lake,  through  a  passage 
in  the  bank  of  the  river,  at  the  head  of  the  said  canal,  made 
there  of  a  pitch  fit  for  this  purpose,  whereby  it  was  prevent- 
ed from  ever  rising  any  higher  below  that  place.  And  the 
water  received  into  the  lake,  at  the  time  of  these  overflow- 
ings, was  there  kept  all  the  year,  as  in  a  common  reservatory 
for  the  benefit  of  the  country,  to  be  let  out  by  sluices,  at  all 
convenient  times,  for  the  watering  of  the  lands  below  it.    So 

k  Berosus  apud  Joseph.  Aiitiq.  lib.  10, c.  11.  1  Diodorus,  lib.  2.  p.  96. 

m  Abydenus,  ibid.     Herodotus,  lib.  1.     Diodorus,  ibid. 

n  According  to  Herodotus,  this  lake  was  four  hundred  and  twenty  furlongs 
square,  that  is,  fifty-two  miles  and  a  half  on  every  side,  and  then  tbe  whole 
compass  must  be  two  hundred  and  ten  miles ;  but,  according  to  Megasthe- 
nes,  the  whole  compass  was  but  forty  parasanga,  that  is,  one  hundred  and 
sixty  miles,  for  each  parasanga  contained  four  of  our  mile? 


BOOK  Il.J      THE  OLD  ANC  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  109 

equally  served  the  convenience  of  Babylon,  and  also  the 
convenience  of  that  part  of  the  province,  in  improving  their 
lands,  and  making  them  the  more  fertile  and  beneficial  to 
them  ;  though  at  last  it  became  the  cause  of  great  mischief 
to  both :  for  it  afforded  to  Cyrus  the  means  of  taking  the 
city,  and  in  the  elTecting  thereof,  became  the  cause  of  drown- 
ing a  great  part  of  that  country,  which  was  never  after  again 
recovered  ;  of  both  which  an  account  will  be  hereafter  given 
in  its  proper  place.  Berosus,  Megasthenes,  and  Abydenus, 
attribute  all  these  works  to  Nebuchadnezzar ;  but  Herodo- 
tus tells  us,  that  the  bridge,  the  river  banks,  and  the  lake, 
were  the  work  of  Nitocris,  his  daughter-in-law.  Perhaps 
Nitocris  finished  what  Nebuchadnezzar  had  left  unperfected 
at  his  death,  and  this  procured  her,  with  that  historian,  the 
honour  of  the  whole. 

All  the  flat  whereon  Babylon  stood,  being,  by  reason  of 
so  many  rivers  and  canals  running  through  it,  made  in  many 
places  marshy,  especially  near  the  said  rivers  and  canals, 
this  caused  it  to  abound  much  in  willows  ;  and  therefore  it  is 
called  in  Scripture,  The  valley  of  willows,  (for  so  the  words, 
Isa.  XV. 7,  which  we  translate,  the  brook  of  the  willows,  ought 
to  be  rendered^:)  and,  for  the  same  reason,  the  Jews  (Psalm 
cxxxvii.  1,  2,)  are  said,  when  they  were  by  the  rivers  of  Ba- 
bylon, in  the  land  of  their  captivity,  to  have  hung  their  harps 
upon  the  willows,  that  is,  because  of  the  abundance  of  them 
which  grew  by  those  rivers. 

At  the  end  of  twelve  months  after  Nebuchadnezzar's  last 
dream,  while  he  was  walking  in  his  palace  at  Baby- 
lon," most  likely  in  his  hanjjinji-gardens,  and  in  the  J^l-  ^^^^■ 
uppermost  terrace  ot  them,  irom  whence  he  might  ii^rse. 
have  a  full  prospect  of  the  whole  city,  he,  proudly 
boasting  of  his  great  works  done  therein  said,  "  Is  not  this 
great  Babylon,  which  I  have  built  for  the  house  of  the  king- 
dom, by  the  might  of  my  power,  and  for  the  honour  of  my 
majesty  ?"p  But,  while  the  words  were  yet  in  his  mouth, 
there  came  a  voice  to  him  from  heaven  to  rebuke  his  pride, 
which  told  him,  that  his  kingdom  was  departed  from  him,  and 
that  he  should  be  driven  from  the  society  of  men,  and  thence- 
forth, for  seven  years,  have  his  dwelling  with  the  wild  beasts 
of  the  field,  there  to  live  like  them  in  a  brutal  manner.  And 
immediately  hereon,  his  senses  being  taken  from  him,  he  fell 
into  a  distracted  condition  ;  and,  continuing  so  for  seven 
years,  he  lived  abroad  in  the  fields,  eating  grass  like  the 
oxen,  and  taking  his  lodgings  on  the  ground,  in  the  open  air- 
as  they  did,  till  his  hair  was  grown  like  eagles'  feathers,  and 

1^  Duniel  iv  p  Daniel  ir.  3P. 


2Q0  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OF  [I'ART  i, 

his  nails  like  birds'  claws.  But,  at  the  end  of  seven 
t"i  ^^:  years,  his  understanding  returning  unto  him,  he  was 
neziar  42.  restored  again  to  his  kingdom,  and  his  former  majesty 
and  honour  re-established  on  him.  And  hereon,  be- 
ing made  fully  sensible  of  the  almighty  power  of  the  God 
of  heaven  and  earth,  and  that  it  is  he  only  that  doth  all  things 
according  to  his  will,  both  in  the  armies  of  heaven,  and 
among  the  inhabitants  of  the  earth,  and  by  his  everlasting 
dominion  disposcth  of  all  things  ^t  his  good  pleasure,  he  did, 
by  a  public  decree,  make  acknowledgment  hereof  through 
all  the  Babylonish  empire,  praising  his  almighty  power,  and 
magnifying  his  mercy  in  his  late  restoration  shown  unto 
him. 

After  this  he  lived  only  one  year,  and  died,  having  reigned, 
An.  56Z  according  to  the  Babylonish  account,  from  the  death 
Nebuchad-  of  his  father,  forty-three  years,  and  according  to  the 
Jewish  account,  from  his  first  coming  with  an  army 
into  Syria,  forty-live  years.  His  death  happened  about  the 
end  of  the  year,  a  little  before  the  conclusion  of  the  thirty- 
seventh  year  of  the  captivity  of  Jehoiachin.  He  was  one 
of  the  greatest  princes  that  had  reigned  in  the  east  for  many 
ages  before  him.  Megasthenes  prefers  him  for  his  valour 
to  Hercules.*^  But  his  greatness,  riches,  and  power,  did  in 
nothing  more  appear,  than  in  his  prodigious  works  at  Baby- 
lon above  described,  which,  for  many  ages  after,  were  spo- 
ken of  as  the  wonders  of  the  world.  He  is  said  at  his  death 
to  have  prophesied  of  the  coming  of  the  Persians,  and  their 
bringing  of  the  Babylonians  in  subjection  to  them.''  But  in 
this  he  spake  no  more,  than  what  we  had  been  informed  of 
by  Daniel  the  prophet,  and,  in  the  interpretation  of  his 
dreams,  been  assured  b)  him  should  speedily  come  to  pass, 
as  accordingl)'  it  did  within  twenty- three  years  after. 

On  the  death  of  this  great  prince,  ^Evilmerodach  his  son 
j^^  ggj  succeeded  him  in  the  Babylonish  empire ;  and,  as  soon 
Eviimero-  as  hc  was  Settled  in  the  throne,  he  released  Jehoia- 
chin, king  of  Judah,  out  of  prison,  after  he  had  lain 
there  near  thirty-seven  years,  and  promoted  him  to  great 
honour  in  his  palace,  admitting  him  to  eat  bread  continually 
at  table,  and  placing  him  there  before  all  the  oth<^r  king>  and 
great  men  of  his  empire,  that  came  to  him  to  Babylon,  and 
also  made  him  a  daily  allowance  to  support  him,  with  an 
equipage  in  all  things  else  suitable  hereto.     Jerome  tells  us,' 

q  Abydemus,  ibid.    Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  11.     Strabo,  lib.  15,  p.  687. 
r  Abydemus,  ibid. 

s  2  Kings  XXV.  27.  Jer.  lii.  31.  Berosus  apud  Josephum  contra  Apionem 
lib.  1,  etEuseb.  Praep.  Evang.  lib.  9. 
*■  romment  in  Esaiam  xiv.  IP. 


iiOOK  U.J  iHE  OLD  AiVD  ^-EVf  TESTAMENTS.  201 

from  an  ancient  tradition  of  the  Jews,  that  Evilmerodachj 
having  had  the  government  of  the  Babylonish  empire  during 
his  father's  distraction,  administered  it  so  ill,  that,  as  soon 
as  the  old  king  came  again  to  himself,  he  put  him  in  prison 
for  it ;  and  that  the  place  of  his  imprisonment  happening  to 
be  the  same  where  Jehoiachin  had  long  lain,  he  there  enter- 
ed into  a  particular  acquaintance  and  friendship  with  him  : 
and  that  this  was  the  cause  of  the  great  kindness  which  he 
afterward  showed  him.  And  since  the  old  historical  tradi- 
tions of  the  Jews  are  often  quoted  in  the  New  Testament," 
if  this  were  such,  it  is  not  wholly  to  be  disregarded,  and  that 
especially  since  the  maladministrations,  which  Evilmerodach 
was  guilty  of  after  his  father's  death,  give  reason  enough  to 
believe,  that  he  could  not  govern  without  them  before. 
For  he  proved  a  very  profligate  and  vicious  prince,  and  for 
that  reason  was  called  Evilmerodach,  that  is,  foolish  Mero- 
dach ;  for  his  proper  name  was  only  Merodach.'^  But,  what- 
soever was  the  inducing  reason,  this  favour  he  showed  to 
the  captive  prince,  as  soon  as  his  father  was  dead.  So  that 
the  last  year  of  Nebuchadnezzar's  reign  was  the  last  of  the 
thirty-seven  years  of  Jehoiachin's  captivity  ;  and  this  shows 
us  when  it  began,  and  serves  to  the  connecting  of  the  chro- 
nology of  the  Babylonish  and  Jewish  history  in  all  other 
particulars.  For  which  reason  it  may  be  useful  to  have  a 
particular  state  of  this  matter,  which  I  take  to  have  been  as 
followeth.  In  the  seventh  year  of  the  reign  of  Nebuchad- 
nezzar, according  to  the  Babylonish  account,^  in  the  begin- 
ning of  the  Jewish  year,  that  is,  in  the  month  of  April  accord- 
ing to  our  year,  Jehoiachin  was  carried  captive  to  Babylon. 
And  therefore  the  first  year  of  his  captivity,  beginning  in  the 
month  of  April,  in  the  seventh  year  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  the 
thirty-seventh  year  of  it  must  begin  in  the  same  month  of 
April,  in  the  forty-third  year  of  Nebuchadnezzar  ;  towards 
the  end  whereof  that  great  king  dying,  with  the  beginning  of 
the  next  year  began  the  first  year  of  the  reign  of  Evilmero- 
dach;  and  the  March  following,^  that  is,  on  the  twenty-se- 
venth day  of  the  twelfth  or  last  month  of  the  Jewish  year, 
Jehoiachin  was,  by  the  great  favour  of  the  new  king,  released 
from  his  captivity,  in  the  manner  as  is  above  expressed, 
about  a  month  before  he  had  fully  completed  thirty-seven 
years  in  it. 

u  By  St.  Stephen,  Acts  vii.  By  St.  Paul,  Heb.  xi.  35—37,  and  to  Tim.  Eph. 
iii.  8,  and  by  St.  Jude,  9,  14,  15. 

X  Berosus,  ibid. 

y  2  Chron.  xxxvi.  10.  For  there  it  is  said,  that  it  was  at  the  return  of  tire 
year. 

z  2  Kings  XXXV  27.    Jer  Iii.  31. 

Vol.  I.  26 


202  CONNEXIOiV  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  T, 

In  the  same  jear,  which  was  the  first  of  Evilmerodach  at 
^^  ^1  Babylon,  Croesus  succeeded  Alyattes  his  father  in 
Kviimero-  the  kingdom  of  Lydia,  and  reigned  there  fourteen 
years.*  This  was  the  twenty-eighth  year  after  the 
destruction  of  Jerusalem,  and  the  forty-sixth  of  the  seventy 
years  captivity  of  Judah. 

When  Evilmerodach  had  reigned  two  years  at  Babylon, 
his  lusts,  and  his  other  wickedness,  made  him  so  intolerable, 
that  at  length  even  his  own  relations  conspired  against  him, 
and  put  him  to  death, **  and  Neriglissar,  his  sister's 
Nerigiffsar  1.  husband,  who  was  the  head  of  the  conspiracy 
against  him,  reigned  in  his  stead. "^  And  since  it  is 
said  that  Jehoiachin  was  fed  by  him  until  the  day  of  his 
death,*^  it  is  inferred  from  hence  that  he  did  not  outlive  him, 
but  that  he  either  died  a  little  before  him,  or  else,  as  a  favou- 
rite, was  slain  with  him.  The  last  seemeth  most  probable,  as 
best  agreeing  with  the  prophecy  of  Jeremiah  concerning 
him  ;  for  it  is  therein  denounced  against  him,  that  he  should 
not  prosper  in  his  days  f  which  could  not  be  so  well  veri- 
fied of  him,  if  he  died  in  full  possession  of  all  that  prosperity 
which  Evilmerodach  advanced  him  unto. 

On  the  death  of  Jehoiachin,  Salathiel,  his  son,  became 
the  nominal  prince  of  the  Jews  after  him.*^  For,  after  the 
loss  of  the  authority,  they  still  kept  up  the  title  ;  and  for  a 
great  many  ages  after,  in  the  parts  about  Babylon,  there  was 
always  one  of  the  house  of  David,  which  by  the  name  of 
The  Head  of  the  captivity,'^  was  acknowledged  and  honoured 
as  a  prince  among  that  people,  and  had  some  sort  of  juris- 
diction, as  far  as  it  was  consistent  with  the  government  they 
were  under,  always  invested  in  him,  and  sometimes  a  ratifi- 
cation was  obtained  of  it  from  the  princes  that  reigned  in 
that  country.  And  it  is  said  this  pageantry  is  still  kept  up 
among  them  -^  and  chiefly,  it  seems,  that  they  may  be  fur- 
nished from  hence  with  an  answer  to  give  the  Christians, 
when  they  urge  the  prophecy  of  Jacob  against  them:  for, 
whensoever  from  that  prophecy  it  is  pressed  upon  them  that 
the  Messiah  must  be  come,  because  the  sceptre  is  now  de- 
parted from  Judah,  and  there  is  no  more  a  lawgiver  among 
them  from  between  his  feet,  we  are  commonly  told  of  This 
Head  of  the  captivity ;    their  usual  answer  being,  that  the 

a  Herodotus,  lib.  1. 

b  lierosus,  ibid.     Megasfhenes  apud  Eiisebium  Praep.  Evang.  lib.  9. 

c  Berosus,  ibid.  Plol. in  Canon.  Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  lO.c.  12.  Megasthenes, 
ibid. 

d  Jer.  Hi.  33.  e  Jer.  xsii.  30.  f  2  Esdras  v.  16. 

g  Vide  Notas  Constantini  L'empereur  ad  Benj.  Itinerarium  p.  192,  &c. 

h  Vide  Jacobi  Altingi  librum  Shilo,  lib.  1,  c.  3,  13,  14,  &c.  Et  Seldenum 
de  Synedrils,  lib.  2j  c,  7.  §  f> 


BOOK  II.J  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  203 

sceptre  is  still  preserved  among  them  in  The  Head  of  the 
captivity  ;  and  that  they  have  also  in  their  Nasi,'  or  prince  of 
the  Sanhedrim  (another  pageantry  officer  of  theirs,)  a  law- 
giver from  between  the  feet  of  Judah  (that  is,  of  his  seed,) 
still  remaining  in  Israel.  But  if  these  officers  are  now 
ceased  from  among  them,  as  some  of  them  will  acknowledge, 
then  this  answer  must  cease  also;  and  the  prophecy  returns 
in  its  full  force  upon  them  ;  and  why  do  they  then  any  longer 
resist  the  power  of  it? 

The  same  year  that  Evilmerodach  was  slain,  died  Astyages 
king  of  Media,  and  after  him  succeeded  Cyaxares  the  second, 
his  son,  in  the  civil  government  of  the  kingdom,  and  Cyrus, 
his  grandson  by  his  daughter  Mandana,  in  the  military. ''" 
Cyrus  at  this  time  was  forty  years  old,'  and  Cyaxares  forty- 
one."*  And  from  this  year  those  who  reckon  to  Cyrus  a 
reign  of  thirty  years  begin  that  computation.  For  Neriglis- 
sar,  on  his  coming  to  the  crown,  making  great  preparations 
for  a  war  against  the  Medcs,  Cyaxares  called  Cyrus  out  of 
Persia  to  his  assistance,  and  on  his  arrival  with  an  army  of 
thirty  thousand  Persians,  Cyaxares  made  him  general  of  the 
Modes  also,  and  sent  him  with  the  joint  forces  of  both  nations 
to  make  war  against  the  Babylonians."  And  from  this  time 
he  was  reckoned  by  all  foreigners  as  king  over  both  these 
nations,  although,  in  reality,  the  regal  power  was  solely  in 
Cyaxares,  and  Cyrus  was  no  more  than  general  of  the  con- 
federate army  under  him.  But,  after  his  death,  he  succeeded 
him  in  the  kingdom  of  the  Medes,  as  he  did  his  father  a  little 
before  in  that  of  Persia  ;  which,  with  the  countries  he  had 
conquered,  made  up  the  Persian  empire,  of  which  he  was 
the  founder  and  first  monarch. 

He  was  a  very  extraordinary  person  in  the  age  in  which 
he  lived,  for  wisdom,  valour,  and  virtue,  and  of  a  name 
famous  in  holy  writ,  not  only  for  being  the  restorer  of  the 
state  of  Israel,"  but  especially  in  being  there  appointed  for  it 
by  name  many  years  before  he  was  born  ;P  which  is  an  honour 
therein  given  to  none, -save  only  to  him,  and  Josiah  king  of 
Judah. 1  He  was  born  (as  hath  been  already  taken  notice 
of,)  on  the  same  year  in  which  Jehoiachin  died.     It  is  on  all 

i  Vide  Bustorfii  Ijexicon  Rabbinicum,  p.  1399,  and  Seldenum  de  Syne- 
driis,  lib.  2,  c.  6. 

k  Cyropedia,  lib.  1. 

1  Cicero,  lib  1.  De  Divinatione  dicit  de  Cyro — Ad  Septuagesimum  pre- 
venit  cum  quadraginta  annos  natus  regnare  ccepisset. 

in  For  he  was  sixty-two  when  he  began  to  reign  in  Babylon,  after  the 
death  of  Belshazzar,  (Dan.  v.  31,)  which  being  nine  years  iiefore  Cyrus's 
death  (who  lived  seventy  years,)  it  must  follow  that  Cyrus  was  then  sixty- 
one,  and  therefore  when  he  was  forty,  Cyaxares  must  have  been  forty-one. 

n  Cyropedia,  lib.  1. 

<»  Ezra  i.  p  Isa.  uliv.  28;  Sixlv.  1.  q  1  Kings  xiii-  2. 


504  CONNEXION  OJP  the;  HISTORY  OP  [I'ART  I. 

bands  agreed  that  his  mother  was  Mandana,  the  daughter  of 
Astyages.  king  of  the  Medes,  and  his  father  Cambyses,  a 
Persian. 

But  whether  this  Cambyses  was  king  of  that  country,  or 
only  a  private  person,  is  not  agreed.  Herodotus,  and  those 
who  follow  him,  allow  him  to  have  been  no  more  than  a 
private  nobleman,  of  the  family  of  Achremenes,  one  of  (he 
most  ancient  in  that  country.  But  Xenophon's  account 
makes  him  king  of  the  Persians,  but  subject  to  the  Medes. 
And  not  only  in  this  particular,  but  also  in  most  things  else 
concerning  this  great  prince,  the  relations  of  these  two  his- 
torians are  very  much  different.  But  Herodotus's  account 
of  him  containing  narratives  which  are  much  more  strange 
and  surprising,  and  consequently  more  diverting  and  ac-" 
ceptable  to  the  reader,  most  have  chosen  rather  to  follow 
him  than  Xenophon,  that  have  written  after  their  times  of 
this  matter.  Wliich  humour  was  much  forwarded  by  Plato,"" 
in  his  giving  a  character  of  Xenophon's  history  of  Cyrus, 
(in  which  he  was  also  followed  by  TuUy,)^  as  if  therein,  un- 
der the  name  of  Cyrus,  he  rather  drew  a  description  of  what 
a  worthy  and  just  prince  ought  to  be,  than  gave  us  a  true 
history  of  what  that  prince  really  was.  It  must  be  acknow- 
ledged, that  Xenophon,  being  a  great  commander,  as  well  as 
a  great  philosopher,  did  graft  many  of  his  maxims  of  war 
and  policy  into  that  history,  and  to  make  it  a  vehicle  for 
this,  perchance  was  his  whole  design  in  writing  that  book. 
But  it  doth  not  follow  from  hence,  but  that  still  the  whole  foun- 
dation and^roundplot  of  the  work  may  be  all  true  history. 
That  he  intended  it  for  such,  is  plain  ;  and  that  it  was  so,  its 
agreeableness  with  the  holy  writ  doth  abundantly  verify-.  And 
the  true  reason  why  he  chose  the  life  of  Cyrus  before  all 
others  for  the  purpose  above-mentioned,  seemeth  to  be  no 
other,  but  that  he  found  the  true  history  of  that  excellent 
and  gallant  prince  to  be  above  all  others  the  fittest  for  those 
maxims  of  right  policy  and  true  princely  virtue  to  correspond 
with,  which  he  grafted  upon  it.  And  therefore,  bating  the 
military  and  political  reflections,  the  descants,  discourses, 
and  speeches  interspersed  in  that  work,  which  must  be  ac- 
knowledged to  have  been  all  of  Xenophon's  addition,  the 
remaining  bare  matters  of  fact  I  take  to  have  been  related 
by  that  author  as  the  true  history  of  Cyrus.  And  thus  far  I 
think  him  to  have  been  a  historian  of  much  better  credit  in 
this  matter  than  Herodotus.  For  Herodotus  having  travelled 
through  Egypt,  Syria,  and  several  other  countries,  in  order 
to  the  writing  of  his  history,  did,  as  travellers  use  to  do,  that 

r  De  Legibus,  lib.  3  s  Ep.  1.  ad  Quintum  fratrern, 


BOOK  n.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  20a 

is,  put  down  all  relations  upon  trust,  as  he  met  with  them, 
and  no  doubt  he  was  imposed  on  in  many  of  them.  But 
Xenophon  was  a  man  of  another  character,*^  who  wrote  all 
things  with  great  judgment  and  due  consideration  ;  and 
having  lived  in  the  court  of  Cyrijs  the  younger,  a  descendant 
of  the  Cyrus  whom  we  now  speak  of,  had  opportunities  of 
being  better  informed  of  what  he  wrote  of  this  great  prince 
than  Herodotus  was  ;  and  confming  himself  to  this  argument 
only,  no  doubt  ho  examined  all  matters  relating  to  it  more 
thoroughly,  and  gave  a  more  accurate  and  exact  account  of 
them,  than  could  be  expected  from  the  other,  who  wrote  of 
all  things  at  large  as  they  came  in  his  way.  And  for  these 
reasons,  in  all  things  relating  to  this  prince,  I  have  chosen  to 
follow  Xenophon  rather  than  any  of  those  who  differ  from 
him. 

For  the  first  twelve  years  of  his  life,  Cyrus  lived  in 
Persia  with  his  father,  and  was  there  educated,  after  the 
Persian  manner,  in  hardship,  and  toil,  and  ail  such  exercises 
as  would  best  tend  to  tit  him  for  the  fatigues  of  war,  in  which 
he  exceeded  all  his  contemporaries.^  But  here  it  must  be 
taken  notice  of,  that  the  name  of  Persia  did  then  ext<md  on- 
ly to  one  province  of  that  large  country,  which  hath  been 
since  so  called :  for  then  the  whole  nation  of  the  Persians 
eould  number  no  more  than  one  hundred  and  twenty  thou- 
sand men.''  But  afterward,  when,  by  the  wisdom  and  valour 
of  Cyrus,  they  had  obtained  the  empire  of  the  East,  the 
name  of  Persia  became  enlarged  with  their  fortunes  ;  and  it 
thenceforth  took  in  all  that  vast  tract,  which  is  extended  east 
and  west  from  the  river  Indus  to  the  Tigris,  and  north  and 
south  from  the  Caspian  Sea  to  the  ocean  ;  and  so  much  that 
name  comprehends  even  to  this  day.  After  Cyrus  was 
twelve  years  old,  he  was  sent  for  into  Media  by  Astyages,  his 
grandfather,  with  whom  he  continued  tive  years  :  and  there, 
by  the  sweetness  of  his  temper,  his  generous  beiiaviour,  and 
his  constant  endeavour  to  do  good  offices  with  his  grand- 
father for  all  he  could,  he  did  so  win  the  hearts  of  the  Medes 
to  him,  and  gained  such  an  interest  among  them,  as  did  af- 
terward turn  very  much  to  his  advantage,  for  the  winning  of 
that  empire  which  he  erected.  In  the  sixteenth  year  of  his 
age,  Evilmerodach,  the  son  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  king  of  Ba- 
bylon and  Assyria,  being  abroad  on  an  hunting  expedition, 
a  little  before  his  marriage,  for  a  show  of  his  bravery,  made 
an  inroad  into  the  territories  of  the  Medes,  which  drew  out* 

t  Diog.  Laerthis  in  vita  Xenophontis.  x  Cyropedia,  lib.  1. 

y  From  hence  it  may  be  inferred,  that  Evilmerodach  was  not  the  son  of 
Nebuchadnezzar  by  Amyitis,  the  daughter  of  Astyages,  but  by  some  other 
wife  it  not  being  likely  that  the  grandfather  and  grandson  would  thus 
engage  in  war  against  each  other. 


206  CONNEXION    OF    THE     HISTORY    OF  [PART  I. 

Astyages  with  his  forces  to  oppose  him.  On  which  occasioD, 
Cyrus,  accompanying  his  grandfather,  then  first  entered  the 
school  of  war;  in  which  he  behaved  himself  so  well,  that  the 
victory  which  was  at  that  time  gained  over  the  Assyrians  was 
chiefly  owing  to  his  valour.  The  next  year  after,  he  went 
home  to  his  father  into  Persia,  and  there  continued  till  the 
fortieth  year  of  his  life  ;  at  which  time  he  was  called  forth 
to  the  assistance  of  his  uncle  Cyaxares,  on  the  occasion 
which  i  have  mentioned.  Hereon  he  marched  out  of  Per- 
sia with  his  army,  and  behaved  himself  so  wisely,  that,  from 
this  small  beginning,  in  twenty  years  time,  he  made  himself 
master  of  the  greatest  empire  that  had  ever  been  erected  in 
the  East  to  that  time,  and  established  it  with  such  wisdom, 
that  upon  the  strength  of  this  foundation  only,  it  stood  above 
two  hundred  years,  notwithstanding  what  was  done  by  his 
successors  (the  worst  race  of  men  that  ever  governed  an 
empire)  through  all  that  time  to  overthrow  it. 

Neriglissar.  upon  intelligence  that  Cyrus  was  come  with 
so  great  an  army  to  the  assistance  of  the  Medes, 
Nerfg'issar 2.  farther  to  strengthen  himself  against  them,^  sent 
ambassadors  to  the  Lydians,  Phrygians,  Carians, 
Cappadocians,  Cilicians,  Paphlagonians,  and  other  neigh- 
bouring nations,  to  call  them  to  his  aid  ;  and  by  represent- 
ing to  them  the  strength  of  the  enemy,  and  the  necessity  of 
maintaining  the  balance  of  power  against  them,  for  the  com- 
mon good  of  Asia,  drew  them  all  into  confederacy  with  him 
for  the  ensuing  war.  Whereon  the  king  of 
Neiig^Jsar 3.  Armenia,  who  had  hitherto  lived  in  subjection  to 
the  Medes,  looking  on  them  as  ready  to  be  swal- 
lowed up  by  so  formidable  a  confederacy  against  them, 
thought  this  a  tit  time  for  the  recovering  of  his  liberty,  and 
therefore  refused  any  longer  to  pay  his  tribute,  or  send 
his  quota  of  auxiliaries  for  the  war,  on  their  being  required 
of  him  f  which  bting  a  matter  that  might  be  of  dangerous 
consequence  to  the  Medes,  in  the  example  it  might  give  to 
other  dependent  states  to  do  the  same,  Cyrus  thought  it  ne- 
cessary to  crush  this  revolt  with  the  utmost  expedition ;  and 
therefore,  marching  immediately  with  the  best  of  his  horse, 
and  covering  his  design  under  the  pretence  of  an  hunting 
match,''  entered  Armenia,  before  there  was  any  intelligence 
of  his  coming,  and,  having  surprised  the  revolted  king,  took 
him  and  all  his  family  prisoners;  and,  after  this,  having  sei- 
zed the  hills  towards  Chaldea,  and  planted  good  forts  and 
garrisons  on  them,  for  the  securing  of  the  country  against 
the  enemy  on  that  side,  he  came  to  new  terms  with  the  cap- 

z  Cyropedia,  lib.  1.        a  Cyropedia,  lib.  2.        b  Cyropedia  lib.  3- 


BOOK  II.]        THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.         207 

tive  king ;  and,  having  received  from  him  the  tribute  and 
auxiharies  which  he  demanded,  he  restored  him  again  to  liis 
kingdom,  and  returned  to  the  rest  of  his  army  in  Media. 
This  happened  about  the  third  year  of  the  reign  of  Nerighs- 
sar,  and  the  thirty-second  after  the  destruction  of  Jerusa- 
lem. 

After  both  parties  had  now  been  for  three  yeai-s  together 
forming  their  aUiances,  and  making  their  prepara- 
tions for  the  war,  in  the  fourth  year  of  Nerighssar,  ^"ri^itsar  4. 
the  confederates  on  both  sides  being  all  drawn  to- 
gether, both  armies  took  the  tield,  and  it  came;  to  a  fierce 
battle  between  them;  in  which  Neriglissar  beirjg  slain,  the 
rest  of  the  Assyrian  army  was  put  to  the  rout,  and  Cyrus  had 
the  victory.*^  Croesus,  king  of  Lydia,  after  the  death  of  Ne- 
righssar, as  being  in  dignity  next  to  him,  took  upon  him  the 
command  of  the  vanquished  army,  and  made  as  good  a  retreat 
with  it  as  he  could.  But  the  next  day  following,  Cyrus,  pur- 
suing after  them,  overtook  them  at  a  disadvantage,  and  put 
them  to  an  absolute  rout,  taking  their  camp,  and  dispossess- 
ing them  of  all  their  baggage;  which  he  etfected  chiefly  by 
the  assistance  of  the  Hyrcanians,  who  had  the  night  before 
revolted  to  him.  Hereon  Croesus,  taking  his  flight  out  of 
Assyria,  made  the  best  of  his  way  into  his  own  country.  He, 
being  aware  of  what  might  happen,  had,  the  night  before, 
sent  away  bis  women,  and  the  best  of  his  baggage  ;  and  there- 
fore, in  this  respect,  escaped  much  better  than  the  rest  of  the 
confederates. 

The  death  of  Neriglissar  was  a  great  loss  to  the  Babylo- 
nians ;  for  he  was  a  very  brave  and  excellent  prince.*  The 
preparations  which  he  made  for  the  war  showed  his  wisdom, 
and  his  dying  in  it  his  valour.  And  there  was  nothing  else 
wanting  in  him  for  his  obtaining  of  better  success  in  it :  and, 
therefore,  that  he  had  it  not,  was  owing  to  nothing  else,  but 
that  he  had  to  deal  with  the  predominant  fortune  of  Cyrus, 
whom  God  had  designed  for  the  empire  of  the  Eat^t,  and 
therefore  nothing  was  to  withstand  him.  But  nothing  made 
the  loss  of  Neriglissar  more  appear,  than  the  succeeding  of 
Laborosoarchod  his  son  in  the  kingdom  after  him  :  for  he 
was  in  every  thing  the  reverse  of  his  father,^  being  given  to 
all  manner  of  wickedness,  cruelty,  and  injustice,  to  which, on 
his  advancement  to  the  throne,  he  did  let  himself  loose  in  the 
utmost  excess,  v/ithout  any  manner  of  restraint  whatsoever, 
as  if  the  regal  oflice,  which  he  was  now  advanced  to,  were 
for  nothing  else  but  to  give  him  a  privilege  of  doing,  without 

c  Cyropedia,  lib.  3k4.        *.  Cyropedia,  lib.  4.        b  Cyropedia,  lib.  4,  S. 


208  CdNNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [^ART  Ir 

control,  all  the  vile  and  flagitious  things  that  he  pleased. 
Two  acts  of  his  tyrannical  violence  towards  two  of  his  prin- 
cipal nobility,  Gobrias  and  Gadates,  are  particularly  men- 
tioned. The  only  son  of  the  former  he  slew  at  a  hunting, 
to  which  he  had  invited  him  for  no  other  reason,  but  that  he 
Iiad  thrown  his  dart  with  success  at  a  wild  beast,  when  he 
himself  htkl  missed  it.  And  the  other  he  caused  to  be  cas- 
trated, only  because  one  of  his  concubines  had  commended 
him  for  a  handsome  man.  These  wrongs  done  those  two 
noblemen  drove  them,  with  the  provinces  which  they  govern- 
ed, into  a  revolt  to  Cyrus ;  and  the  whole  state  of  the  Ba- 
bylonish empire  suffered  by  it:  for  Cyrus,  encouraged  here- 
by penetrated  into  the  very  heart  of  the  enemy's  country, 
first  taking  possession  of  the  province,  and  garrisoning  the 
castles  of  Gobrias,  and  afterward  doing  the  same  in  the  pro- 
vince and  castles  of  Gadates.*^  The  Assyrian  king  was  before 
him  in  the  latter,  to  be  revenged  on  Gadates  for  his  re- 
volt. But  Cyrus,  on  his  coming,  having  put  him  to  the  rout, 
and  slain  a  great  number  of  his  men,  forced  him  again  to  re- 
treat to  Babylon.  After  Cyrus  had  thus  spent  the  summer  in 
ravaging  the  whole  country,  and  twice  shown  himself  before 
the  walls  of  Babylon,  to  provoke  the  enemy  to  battle,  at  the 
end  of  the  year  he  led  back  his  army  again  towards  Media; 
and,  ending  the  campaign  with  the  taking  of  three  fortresses 
on  the  frontiers,  there  entered  into  winter-quarters,  and  sent 
for  Cyaxares  to  come  thither  to  him,  that  they  might  consult 
together  about  the  future  operations  of  the  war. 

As  soon  as  Cyrus  was  retreated,  Laborosoarchod,  being 
now  freed  from  the  fear  of  the  enemy,  gave  himself  a  tho- 
rough loose  to  all  the  flagitious  inclinations  that  were  predo- 
minant in  him  ;  which  carried  him  into  so  many  wicked  and 
unjust  actions,  like  those  which  Gobrias  and  Gadates  had 
suffered  from  him,  that,  being  no  longer  tolerable,  his  own 
people  conspired  against  him,  and  slew  him,  after  he  had 
reigned  only  nine  months.*^  He  is  not  named  in  the  canon  of 
Ptolemy  ;  for  it  is  the  method  of  that  canon  to  ascribe  all 
the  year  to  hina  that  was  king  in  the  beginning  of  it,  how 
soon  soever  he  died  after,  and  not  to  reckon  the  reign  of  the 
successor,  but  from  the  first  day  of  the  year  ensuing;  and 
therefore,  if  any  king  reigned  in  the  interim,  and  did  not 
live  to  the  beginning  of  the  next  year,  his  name  was  not  put 
into  the  canon  at  all.  And  this  was  the  case  of  Laboroso- 
archod ;  for  Neriglissar  his  father  being  slain  in  battle,  in  the 

c  Cyropedia,  lib.  5. 

d  Berosus  apud  Josephiini  contra  Apionem  lib.   1.    Megasthenes  apud 
Euseb.  Praep.  Evang.  lib.  9.    Joseplm?  Antiq-lib.  10,  c,  12. 


BOOK  il.J  tHE    OLD  AND  MiW  XilSTAMENfS.  209 

beginning  of  the  spring,  the  nine  months  of  his  son's  reign 
ended  before  the  next  year  began  :  and  therefore  the  whole 
of  that  year  is  reckoned  to  the  last  of  Nerighssar,  and  the 
beginning  of  the  next  belonged  to  his  successor :  and  this  was 
the  reason  that  he  is  not  at  all  mentioned  in  that  canon. 

After  him  succeeded  Nabonadius,*^  and  reigned  seventeen 
years.  Berosus  calls  him  Nabonnedus/  Megasthenes, 
Nabonnidochus,5  Herodotus  Nabynetus,^  and  Jose-  Beuh4zff. 
phus  Naboandelus,"  who,  he  saith,  is  the  same  with 
Belshazzar.  And  there  is  as  great  a  difference  among  wri- 
ters, what  he  was,  as  well  as  what  he  was  called.  Some^- 
will  have  him  to  be  of  the  royal  blood  of  Nebuchadnezzar, 
and  others,'  no  way  at  all  related  to  him.  And  some  say"" 
he  was  a  Babylonian,  and  others"  that  he  was  of  the  seed 
of  the  Medes.  And  of  those  who  allow  him  to  have  been 
of  the  royal  family  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  some  will  have  it 
that  he  was  his  son,  and  others,  that  he  was  his  grandson. 
For  the  clearing  of  this  matter,  these  following  particu- 
lars are  to  be  taken  notice  of:  1st,  That  he  is  on  all  hands 
agreed  to  have  been  the  last  of  the  Babylonish  kings.  2dly, 
That  therefore  he  must  have  been  the  same  who  in  Scrip- 
ture is  called  Belshazzar :  for,  immediately  after  the  death 
of  Belshazzar,  the  kingdom  was  given  to  the  Medes  and 
Persians.  (Dan.  v.  28,  30,  31.)  3dly,  That  he  was  of  the  seed 
of  Nebuchadnezzar;  for  he  is  called  his  son,  and  Nebuchad- 
nezzar is  said  to  be  his  father,  in  several  places  of  the  same 
fifth  chapter  of  Daniel ;  and  in  the  second  book  of  Chroni- 
cles, (chap,  xxxvi.  20,)  it  is  said  that  Nebuchadnezzar  and 
his  children,  or  offspring,  reigned  at  Babylon  till  the  kingdom 
of  Persia.  4thly,  That  the  nations  of  the  East  were  to 
serve  Nebuchadnezzar,  and  his  son,  and  his  son's  son,  ac- 
cording to  the  prophecy  of  Jeremiah  ;  (chap,  xxvii.  7,)  and 
therefore  he  must  have  had  a  son,  and  a  son's  son,  successors 
to  him  in  the  throne  of  Babylon.  Sthly,  That  as  Evilmero- 
dach  was  his  son,  so  none  but  Belshazzar,  of  all  the  kings 
that  reigned  after  him  at  Babylon,  could  be  his  son's  son  ; 
for  Nerighssar  was  only  his  daughter's  husband,  and  Laboro- 
soarchod  was  the  son  of  Nerighssar ;  and  therefore  neither 
of  them  was  either  son,  or  son's  son,  to  Nebuchadnezzar. 
6thly,  That  this  last  king  of  Babylon  is  said,  by  Herodotus," 

e  Canon  Ptolemaei.  f  Apud  Josephum  contra  Apionem,  lib.  1. 

g  Apud  Euseb.  Pr»p.  Evang.  lib.  9.  h  Herodotus,  lib.  1. 

i  Antiq.lib.  10.  c.  11. 

k  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  10.  c.  11.  1  Megasthenes,  ib. 

m  Beroius,  ibid. 

n  Scaliger  in  iiotis  ad  Fragmenta  veterum  Graecorum  selecta:  et  de  emen- 
^atione  temporum.  lib.  6.  cap.  De  Regibus  Babylenis. 
o  Herodotus,  lib   1. 
Vol,  J-.  3^ 


210  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OF  [pART  1^ 

to  be  son  to  the  great  queen  Nitocris ;  and  therefore  sh6 
must  have  been  the  wife  of  a  king  of  Babylon  to  make  her 
so  :  and  he  could  have  been  none  other  than  Evilmerodach  ; 
for  by  that  king  of  Babylon  only  could  she  have  a  son,  that 
was  son's  son  to  Nebuchadnezzar.  And  therefore,  putting 
all  this  together,  it  appears,  that  this  Nabonadius,  the  last 
king  of  Babylon,  was  the  same  with  him  that  in  Scripture  is 
called  Belshazzar ;  and  that  he  was  the  son  of  Evilmerodach, 
by  Nitocris  his  queen,  and  so  son's  son  to  Nebuchadnezzar. 
And  that  whereas  he  is  called  the  son  of  Nebuchadnezzar  in 
the  fifth  chapter  of  Daniel,  and  Nebuchadnezzar  is  there 
called  his  father,  this  is  to  be  understood  in  the  large  sense, 
wherein  any  ancestor  upward,  is  often  called  father,  and  any 
descendant  downward,  son,  according  to  the  usual  style  of 
Scripture. 

This  new  king  came  young  to  the  crown  ;  and  had  he 
been  wholly  left  to  himself,  the  Babylonians  would  have 
gotten  but  little  by  the  change ;  for  he  hath,  in  Xenophon, 
the  character  of  an  impious  prince  f  and  it  sufficiently  ap- 
pears, by  what  is  said  of  him  in  Daniel,  that  he  was  so.  But 
his  mother,  who  was  a  woman  of  great  understanding  and  a 
masculine  spirit,  came  in  to  their  relief:  for,  while  her  son 
followed  his  pleasures,  she  took  the  main  burden  of  the  go- 
vernment upon  her,  and  did  all  that  could  be  done  by  human 
wisdom  to  preserve  it."^  But  God's  appointed  time  for  its  fall 
approaching,  it  was  beyond  the  power  of  any  wisdom  to  pre- 
vent it. 

On  the  coming  of  Cyaxares  to  Cyrus's  camp,  and  consul- 
tation thereon  had  between  them  concerning  the  future  car- 
rying on  of  the  war,  it  was  found,  that,  by  ravaging  and 
plundering  the  countries  of  the  Babylonish  empire,  they  did 
not  at  all  enlarge  their  own  ;  and  therefore  it  was  resolved 
to  alter  the  method  of  the  war  for  the  future,  and  to  apply 
themselves  to  the  besieging  of  the  fortresses,  and  the  taking 
of  their  towns,  that  so  they  might  make  themselves  masters 
of  the  country,  and  in  this  sort  of  war  they  employed  them- 
selves for  the  next  seven  years."" 

In  the  mean  time  Nitocri?  did  all  that  she  could  to  fortify 
the  country  against  them,  and  especially  the  city  of  Babylon  ; 
and  therefore  did  set  herself  diligently  to  perfect  all  the 
works  that  Nebuchadnezzar  had  left  unfinished  there,  espe- 
cially the  walls  of  the  city,  and  the  banks  of  the  river  within 
it.^  By  this  last  she  fortified  the  city  as  much  against  the 
river  by  walls  and  gates,  as  it  was  against  the  land  ;  and,  had 
it  been  in  both  places  equally  guarded,  it  could  never  have 

y.roped.  lib.  7     »}  Herod,  lib.  1.     r  Cyroped.  lib.  6.      s  Herod,  lib.  T 


K0OK  IJ.J  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  211 

been  taken.  And,  moreover,  while  the  river  was  turned 
for  the  finishing  of  these  banks  and  walls,  she  caused  a  won- 
derful vault  or  gallery  to  be  made  under  the  river,  leading 
across  it  from  the  old  palace  to  the  new,  twelve  feet  high, 
and  fifteen  feet  wide,  and  having  covered  it  over  with  a 
strong  arch,  and  over  that  with  a  layer  of  bitumen  six  feet 
thick,  she  turned  the  river  again  over  it  •,^  for  it  is  the  nature 
of  that  bitumen,  to  petrify  when  water  comes  over  it,  and 
grow  as  hard  as  stone  ;  and  thereby  the  vault  or  gallery  un- 
der was  preserved  from  having  any  of  the  water  of  the  river 
to  pierce  through  into  it.  The  use  this  was  intended  for,  was 
to  preserve  a  communication  between  the  two  palaces, 
whereof  one  stood  on  the  one  side  of  the  river,  and  the  other 
on  the  other  side,  that  in  case  one  of  them  were  distressed 
(for  they  were  both  fortresses  strongly  fortified,)  it  might  be 
relieved  from  the  other;  or,  in  case  either  were  taken,  there 
might  be  a  way  to  retreat  from  it  to  the  other.  But  all  these 
cautions  and  provisions  served  in  no  stead  when  the  city  was 
taken  by  surprise,  because,  in  that  hurry  and  confusion 
which  men  were  then  in,  none  of  them  were  made  use  of. 

In  the  first  year  of  this  king's  reign,  which  was  the  thirty- 
fourth  after  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem,  Daniel  had 
revealed  unto  him  the  vision  of  the  four  monarchies,  Beishtz.i. 
and  of  the  kingdom  of  the  Messiah  that  was  to  suc- 
ceed after  them  ;  which  is  at  full  related  in  the  seventh  chap- 
ter of  Daniel. 

In  the  third  year  of  king  Belshazzar,  Daniel  saw  the  vision 
of  the  ram  and  the  he-goat,  whereby  were  signified 
the  overthrow  of  the  Persian  empire  by  Alexander  Beishat  s. 
the  Great,  and  the  persecution  that  was  to  be  raised 
against  the  Jews  by  Antiochus  Epiphanes,  king  of  Syria. 
This  vision  is  at  full  related  in  the  eighth  chapter  of  Da- 
niel ;  and  it  is  there  said,  that  it  was  revealed  unto  him  at  Shu- 
shan,  in  the  palace  of  the  king  of  Babylon,  while  he  attended 
there  as  a  counsellor  and  minister  of  state  about  the  king's 
business ;  which  shows,  that  Shushan,  with  the  province  of 
Elam,  of  which  it  was  the  metropolis,  was  then  in  the  hands 
of  the  Babylonians.  But,  about  three  years  after,  Abradates, 
viceroy  or  prince  of  Shushan,  revolting  to  Cyrus,  it  was 
thenceforth  joined  to  the  empire  of  the  Medes  and  Persians ; 
and  the  Elamites  came  up  with  the  Medes  to  besiege  Baby- 
lon, according  to  the  prophecy  of  Isaiah  (chap.  xxi.  2,)  and 
Elam  was  again  restored,  according  to  the  prophecy  of  Jere- 
miah, (chap.  xlix.  39,)  for  it  recovered  its  liberty  again  under 

t  Herodotus,  lib.  1.     Diod.  Sic.  lib.  2.    Philostratus,.  lib.  1,  c.  18. 


212  CONNEXION   OF  TJJE  JilSTORy  OF  [PART  I. 

the  Persians,  which  it  had  been  deprived  of  under  the  Baby- 
lonians. 

The  Medes  and  Persians  growing  still  upon  the  Babylo- 
nians, and  Cyrus  making  great  progress  in  his  con- 
Bdsba^s.  q'lcsls,  by  taking  fortresses,  towns,  and  provinces, 
from  them,  to  put  a  stop  to  this  prevailing  power, 
the  king  of  Babylon,  about  the  fifth  year  of  his  reign,  taking 
a  great  part  of  his  treasure  with  him,  goes  into  Lydia,  to 
King  Crcesus,  his  confederate,  and  there,  by  his  assistance, 
framed  a  very  formidable  confederacy  against  the  Medes  and 
Persians;  and,  with  his  money,  hiring  a  very  numerous  army 
of  Egyptians,  Greeks,  Thracians,  and  all  the  nations  of  Les- 
ser Asia,  he  appointed  Croesus  to  be  their  general,  and  sent 
him  with  them  to  invade  Media,  and  then  returned  again  to 
Babylon." 

Cyrus,  having  full  intelligence  of  all  these  proceedings 
from  one  of  his  confidents,  who,  by  his  order,  under  the  pre-' 
tence  of  a  deserter,  had  gone  over  to  the  enemy,  made  suit- 
able preparations  to  withstand  the  storm,  and,  when  all  was 
ready,  marched  against  the  enemy.  By  this  time 
B^hfz.%.  Crtv^sus  had  passed  over  the  river  Halys,  taken  the 
city  of  Pteria,  and  in  a  manner  destroyed  all  the 
country  thereabout.^  But,  before  he  could  pass  any  farther, 
Cyrus  came  up  with  him,  and,  having  engaged  him  in  battle, 
put  all  his  numerous  army  to  flight ;  whereon  Croesus  re- 
turning to  Sardis,  the  chief  city  of  his  kingdom,  dismissed  all 
his  auxiliaries  to  their  respective  homes,  ordering  them  to 
he  again  with  him  by  the  beginning  of  the  ensuing  spring,  and 
sent  to  all  his  allies  for  the  raising  of  more  forces  to  be 
ready  against  the  same  time,  for  the  carrying  on  of  the  next 
year's  war ;  not  thinking  that,  in  the  interim,  now  winter 
being  approaching,  he  should  have  any  need  of  them.  But 
Cyrus,  pursuing  the  advantage  of  his  victory,  followed  close 
after  him  into  Lydia,  and  there  came  upon  him  just  as  he  had 
dismissed  his  auxiliaries.  However,  Croesus,  getting  to- 
gether all  his  own  forces,  stood  battle  against  him.  But  the 
Lydians  being  mostly  horse,  Cyrus  brought  his  camels  against 
them,  whose  smell  the  horses  not  being  able  to  bear,  they 
were  all  put  into  disorder  by  it ;  whereon  the  Lydians  dis- 
mounting, fought  on  foot ;  but  being  soon  overpowered,  were 
forced  to  make  their  retreat  to  Sardis,  where  Cyrus  imme- 
diately shut  them  up  in  a  close  siege- 
While  he  lay  there,  he  celebrated  the  funeral  of  Abradates 
andPanthea  his  wife.>     lie  was  prince  of  Shushan  under  the 

u  Cyropedia/,  lib.  <5.  ■»  Hf  ro(]o(iis.  Uh.  1.     Cyropedia.  Hb.  & 

y  Cyropctlia.  lib.  7. 


HOOK  II.]  THE  OLD  AND  NSW  TESTAMENTS.  213 

Babylonians,  and  had  revolted  to  Cyrus  about  two  years  be- 
fore, as  hath  been  already  mentioned.  His  wife,  a  very 
beautiful  woman,^  had  been  taken  prisoner  by  Cyrus  in  his 
tirst  battle  against  the  Babylonians.  Cyrus  having  treated 
her  kindly,  and  kept  her  chastely  for  her  husband,  the  sense 
of  this  generosity  drew  over  this  prince  to  him  f  and  he 
happening  to  be  slain  in  this  war,  as  he  was  Hghting  valiantly 
in  his  service,  his  wife,  out  of  grief  for  his  death,  slew  her- 
self upon  his  dead  body,  and  Cyrus  took  care  to  have  them 
both  hoiiourably  buried  together,  and  a  stately  monument 
was  erected  over  them  near  the  river  Paclolus,  where  it  re- 
mained many  ages  after. 

Croesus,  being  shut  up  in  Sardis,^  sent  to  all  his  allies  for 
succours  ;  but  Cyrus  pressed  the  siege  so  vigorously,  that  he 
took  the  city  before  any  of  them  could  arrive  to  its  relief, 
and  Croesus  in  it,  whom  he  condemned  to  be  burned  to 
death  :  and  accordingly  a  great  pile  of  wood  was  laid  toge- 
ther, and  he  was  placed  on  the  top  of  it  for  the  execution  ;  in 
which  extremity,  calling  to  mind  the  conference  he  formerly 
had  with  Solon,  cried  out  with  a  great  sigh,  three  times, 
Solon,  Solon,  Solon.  This  Solon  was  a  wise  Athenian,  and 
the  greatest  philosopher  of  his  time,  who  coming  to  Sardis 
on  some  occasion,  Croesus,  out  of  the  vanity  and  pride  of  his 
mind,  caused  all  his  riches,  treasures,  and  stores,  to  be  shown 
unto  hiiii,  expecting  that,  on  his  having  seen  them,  he  should 
have  applauded  his  felicity,  and  pronounced  him  of  all  men 
the  most  happy  herein  ;  but,  on  hisdiscourse  with  him,  Solon 
plainly  told  him,  that  he  could  pronounce  no  man  happy,  as 
long  as  he  lived,  because  no  one  could  foresee  what  might 
happen  unto  him  before  his  death.  Of  the  truth  of  which 
Croesus  being  now  thoroughly  convinced  by  his  present  cala- 
mity, this  made  him  call  upon  the  name  of  Solon  ;  whereon 
Cyrus,  sending  to  know  what  he  meant  by  it,  had  the  whole 
story  related  to  him  ;  which  excited  in  him  such  a  sense  of  the 
uncertainty  of  all  human  felicity,  and  such  a  compassion  for 
Croesus,  that  he  caused  him  to  be  taken  down  from  the  pile, 
just  as  tire  had  been  put  to  it,  and  not  only  spared  his  life, 
but  allowed  him  a  very  honourable  subsistence,  and  made 
use  of  him  as  one  of  his  chief  counsellors  all  his  life  after  ; 
and,  at  his  death,  recommended  him  to  his  son  Cambyses,  as 
the  person  whose  advice  he  would  have  him  chiefly  to  follow. '- 
The  taking  of  this  city  happened  in  the  tirst  year  of  the  fifty- 
eighth  Olympiad,'^  wliich  was  the  eighth  year  of  Bclshazzar, 
and  the  forty-tirst  after  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem. 

z  Cyropedia,  lib.  5.  a  Cyiopedia,  lib.  6, 

t)  Herodotus,  lib.  1.     Cyropedia,  lib.  7. 
c  Flutarclius  in  vita  Solonis,  Herodotus,  lib,  1. 
/<  Solinas,  cap.  7.    Eiisebius  in  Chronico. 


214  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

CrtBsus  being  a  very  religious  prince,  according  to  the  idola- 
trous superstition  of  those  times,®entered  notonthis  warwith- 
out  having  first  consulted  all  his  gods,  and  taken  their  advice 
about  it ;  and  he  had  two  oracular  answers  given  him  from 
them,  which  chiefly  conduced  to  lead  him  into  this  unfortu- 
nate undertaking,  that  cost  him  the  loss  of  his  kingdom.  The 
one  of  them  was,  that  CraiMis  should  then  only  think  himself 
in  danger,  when  a  mule  should  reign  over  the  Modes  ;'^  and 
the  other,  that  when  he  should  pass  over  Halys,  to  make  war 
upon  the  Medes,  he  should  overthrow  a  great  empire.     The 
first,  from  the  impossibility  of  the  thing  that  ever  a  mule 
should  be  a  king,  made  him  argue  that  he  was  for  ever  safe. 
The  second  made  him  believe,  that  the  empire  that  he  should 
overthrow,  on  his  passing  over  the  river  Halys,  should  be  the 
empire  of  the  Medes.     And  this  chiefly  encouraged  him  in 
this  expedition,  contrary  to  the  advice  of  one  of  the  wisest 
of  his  friends,  who  earnestly  dissuaded  him  from  it.     But 
now  all  things  having  happened  otherwise  than  these  oracles 
had  made  him  expect,  he  obtained  leave  of  Cyrus   to  send 
messengers  to  the  temples  of  those  gods  who  had  thus  mis- 
led him,  to  expostulate  with  them  about  it.     The  answers 
■which  he  had  hereto  were,  that  Cyrus  was  the  mule  intend- 
ed by  the  oracle  ;  for  that  he  was  born  of  two  diflferent  kinds 
of  people,  of  the  Persians  by  his  father,  and  of  the  Medes  by 
his  mother,  and  was  of  the  more  noble  kind  by  his  mother. 
And  the  empire  which  he  was  to  overthrow,  by  his  passing 
over  Halys,  was  his  own.    By  such  false  and  fallacious  ora- 
cles did  those  evil  spirits,  from  whom  the)  proceeded, delude 
mankind    in    those   days ;    rendering    their   answers,  whea 
consulted,  in  such  dubious  and  ambiguous  terms,  that  what- 
soever the  event  were,  they  might  admit  of  an  interpretation 
to  agree  with  it. 

After  this  Cyrus  continued  some  time  in  Lesser  Asia,  tiJl 
he  had  brought  all  the  several  nations  which  inhabited  in  it, 
from  the  Egean  Sea  to  the  Euphrates,  into  thorough  subjection 
to  him.s  From  hence  he  went  into  Syria  and  Arabia,  and 
there  did  the  same  thing;  and  then  marched  into  the  upper 
countries  of  Asia,  and,  having  there  also  settled  all  things  in 
a  thorough  obedience  under  his  dominion,  he  again  en- 
Bei'shl"'.  iG.  tered  Assyria, and  marched  on  towards  Babylon,  that 
being  the  only  place  of  all  the  East  which  now  held 
out  against  him  :  and,  having  overthrown  Belshazzarin  battle, 

e  Herodotus,  lib.  1.     Cyropedia,  lib.  7. 

f  Nebuchadnezzar  prophesied  of  the  coming  of  Cyrus  under  the  same 
appellation,  telling  the  Babylonians,  at  the  time  of  his  death,  that  a  Persian 
mule  should  come  and  reduce  them  into  servitude.  So  saith  Megasthenes- 
in  Eusebius  dc  Praep.  Evang.  lib.  9. 

3  Herodotus,  lib.  J.    Cyropedia,  lib.  7, 


BOOK  II. j       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.         2tb 

he  shut  him  up  in  Babylon,  and  there  besieged  him.  This 
happened  in  the  ninth  year  after  the  taking  of  Sardis,  and  in 
the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  year  of  Belshazzar.  13ut  this 
siege  proved  a  very  difficult  work :  for  the  walls  were  high 
and  impregnable,  the  number  of  men  within  to  defend  them 
very  great,  and  they  were  fully  furnished  with  all  sorts  of 
provisions  for  twenty  years,  and  the  void  ground  within  the 
walls  was  able  both  by  tillage  and  pasturage  to  furnish  them 
with  much  more.''  And  therefore  the  inhabitants,  thinking 
themselves  secure  in  their  walls  and  their  stores,  looked  on 
the  taking  of  the  city  by  a  siege  as  an  impracticable  thing ; 
and  therefore,  from  the  lop  of  their  walls,  scotied  at  Cyrus, 
and  derided  him  for  every  thing  he  did  towards  it.  tlowever, 
he  went  on  with  the  attempt ;  and  first  he  drew  a  line  of  cir- 
cumvallation  round  the  city,  making  the  ditch  broad  and 
deep,  and  by  the  help  of  the  palm-trees,'  which  usually  grow 
in  that  country  to  the  height  of  an  hundred  feet,  he  erected 
towers  higher  than  the  walls,  thinking  at  first  to  have  been 
able  to  take  the  place  by  assault;  but  finding  little  success 
this  way,  he  applied  himself  wholly  to  the  starving  of  it  into 
a  surrender,  reckoning  that  the  more  people  there  were 
within,  the  sooner  the  work  would  be  done.  But,  that  he 
might  not  over  fatigue  his  army,  by  detaining  them  all  at  this 
work,  he  divided  all  the  forces  of  the  enipire  into  twelve 
parts,  and  appointed  each  its  month  to  guard  the  trenches. 
But,  after  near  two  years  had  been  wasted  this  way,  and 
nothing  effected,  he  at  length  lighted  on  a  stratagem,  which, 
with  little  difficulty,  made  him  master  of  the  place :  for  un- 
derstanding that  a  great  annual  festival  was  to  be  kept 
at  Babylon  on  a  day  approaching,  and  that  it  was  Beishaz.^i?' 
usual  for  the  Babylonians  on  that  solemnity  to  spend 
the  whole  night  in  revelling,  drunkenness,  and  all  manner 
of  disorders,  he  thought  this  a  proper  time  to  surprise  them ;' 
and,  for  the  effecting  of  it,  he  had  this  device  :  He  sent  up  a 
party  of  his  men  to  the  head  of  the  canal  leading  to  the  great 
lake  above  described,  with  orders,  at  a  time  set,  to  break 
down  the  great  bank  or  dam,  which  was  between  the  river 
and  that  canal,  and  to  turn  the  whole  current  that  way  into 
the  lake.  In  the  interim,  getting  all  his  forces  together,  he 
posted  one  part  of  them  at  the  place  where  the  river  ran 
into  the  city,  and  the  other  where  it  canie  out,  with  orders 
to  enter  the  city  that  night  by  the  channel  of  the  river,  as 
soon  as  they  should  find  it  fordable.  And  then,  toward  the 
evening,  he  opened  the  head  of  the  trenches  on  both  sides- 
fa  Vide  Q.  Curlium,  lib.  5,  c.  1.  i  ('yropedia,  lib.  '7, 
k  Herodotus,  lib.  1.    Cyrapedia,  lib.*? 


216  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART  i- 

Ihe  river  above  the  city,  to  let  the  water  of  it  run  into  them. 
And,  by  this  means,  and  the  opening  of  the  great  dam,  the 
river  was  so  drained,  that,  by  the  middle  of  the  night,  it  being 
then  in  a  manner  empty,  both  parties,  according  to  their 
orders,  entered  the  channel,  the  one  having  Gobrias,  and  the 
other  Gadates,  for  their  guides  ;  and  tiiiding  tlie  gates  leadmg 
down  to  the  river,  which  used  on  all  other  nights  to  be  shut, 
then  all  left  open,  through  the  neglect  and  disorder  of  that 
time  of  looseness,  they  ascended  through  them  into  the  city  ; 
and  both  parties  being  met  at  the  palace,  as  had  been  con- 
certed between  them,  they  there  surprised  the  guards,  and 
slew  them  all :  and  when,  on  the  noise,  some  that  were  with-, 
in  opened  the  gates  to  know  what  it  meant,  they  rushed  in 
upon  them  and  took  the  palace  ;  where,  tiiiding  the  king  with 
his  svvord  drawn  at  the  head  of  those  who  were  at  hand  to 
assist  him,  they  slew  him  valiantly  fighting  for  his  life,  and  all 
those  that  were  with  him.  After  this,  proclamation  being 
made  of  life  and  safety  to  all  such  as  should  bring  in  their 
arms,  and  of  death  to  all  that  should  refuse  so  to  do,  all 
quietly  yielded  to  the  conquerors,  and  Cyrus,  without  any 
farther  resistance,  became  master  of  the  place :  and  this 
concluded  all  his  conquests,  after  a  war  of  twenty-one  years; 
for  so  long  was  it  from  his  coming  out  of  I'ersia  with  his  army, 
for  the  assistance  of  Cyaxares,  to  his  taking  of  Babylon; 
during  all  which  time  he  lay  abroad  in  the  field,  carrying  on 
his  conquests  from  place  to  place,  till  at  length  he  had  sub- 
dued all  the  East,  from  the  Egean  Sea  to  the  river  Indus,  and 
thereby  erected  the  greatest  empire  that  had  ever  been  in 
Asia  to  that  time ;  which  work  was  owing  as  much  to  his 
wisdom  as  his  valour,  for  he  equally  excelled  in  both.  And 
he  was  also  a  person  of  that  great  candour  and  humanity  to 
all  men,  that  he  made  greater  conquests  by  his  courtesy,  and 
his  kind  treatment  of  all  he  had  to  do  with,  than  by  his  sword, 
vrhereby  he  did  knit  the  hearts  of  all  men  to  him  ;  and  in  this 
foundation  lay  the  greatest  strength  of  his  empire,  when  he 
first  erected  it. 

This  account  Herodotus  and  Xenophon  both  give  of 
the  taking  of  Babylon  by  Cyrus;  and  herein  they  exact- 
ly agree  with  the  Scripture.  For  Daniel  tells  us,'  that 
Belshazzar  made  a  great  feast  for  a  thousand  of  his  lords, 
and  for  his  wives,  and  for  his  concubines,  and  that  in  that 
very  night  he  was  slain,  and  Darius  the  Mede,  that  is, 
Cyaxares,  the  uncle  of  Cyrus,  took  the  kingdom  ;  for  Cy- 
rus allowed  him  the  title  of  all  his  conquests,  as  long  as 
he  lived.  In  this  feast  Belshazzar  having  impiously  pro- 
faned   the  gold  and  silver  vessels  that  were  taken  out  of 

\  Daniel  v. 


BOOK  il.J        THE  OLD  AND    NEW  TESTAMENTS.         217 

the  (emple  of  Jerusalem,  in  causing  them  to  be  brought 
into  the  banqueting-house,  and  there  drinking  out  of  them, 
he,  and  his  lords,  and  his  wives,  and  his  concubines,  God 
did,  in  a  very  extraordinary  and  wonderful  manner,  express 
his  wrath  against  him  for  the  wickedness  hereof ;  for  he 
caused  an  hand  to  appear  on  the  wall,  and  there  write  a 
sentence  of  immediate  destruction  against  him  for  it.  The 
king  saw  the  appearance  of  the  hand  that  wrote  it;  for  it 
was  exactly  over  against  the  place  where  he  sat.  And 
therefore,  being  exceedingly  affrighted  and  troubled  at  it, 
he  commanded  all  his  wise  men,  magicians,  and  astrologers, 
to  be  immediately  called  for,  that  they  might  read  the 
writing,  and  make  known  unto  him  the  meaning  of  it. 
But  none  of  them  being  able  to  do  it,  the  queen-mother, 
on  her  hearing  of  this  wonderful  thing,  came  into  the  ban- 
queting-house, and  acquainted  the  king  of  the  great  skill 
and  ability  of  Daniel  in  such  matters  ;  whereon  he  being 
sent  for,  did  read  to  the  king  the  writing,  and,  boldly  tell- 
ing him  of  his  many  iniquities  and  transgressions  against  the 
great  God  of  heaven  and  earth,  and  particularly  in  pro- 
faning, at  that  banquet,  the  holy  vessels  which  had  been 
consecrated  to  his  service  in  his  temple  at  Jerusalem,  made 
him  understand  that  this  handwriting  was  a  sentence  from 
heaven  against  him  for  it,  the  interpretation  of  it  being, 
that  his  kingdom  was  taken  from  him,  and  given  to  the 
Medes  and  Persians.™  And  it  seemeth  to  have  been  un- 
mediately  upon  it  that  the  palace  was  taken,  and  Belshaz- 
zar  slain  ;  for  candles  were  lighted  before  the  handwriting 
appeared,"  some  time  after  this  must  be  required  for  the  call- 
ing of  the  wise  men,  the  magicians,  and  astrologers,  and 
some  time  must  be  wasted  in  their  trying  in  vain  to  read  the 
writing.  After  that  the  queen-mother  came  from  her  apart- 
ment into  the  banqueting-house  to  direct  the  king  to  send 
for  Daniel,  and  then  he  was  called  for,  perchance  from 
some  distant  place.  And  by  this  time  many  hours  of  the 
night  must  have  been  spent ;  and  therefore  we  may  well 
suppose,  that,  by  the  time  Daniel  had  interpreted  the 
writing,  the  Persians  were  got  within  the  palace,  and  im- 
mediately executed  the  contents  of  it,  by  slaying  Belshaz- 
zar,  and  all  his  lords  that  were  with  him.  The  queen,  that 
entered  the  banqueting-house  to  direct  the  king  to  call  for 
Daniel,  could  not  be  his  wife  ;  for  all  his  wives  and  con- 
cubines,  the  text   tells  us,  sat  with  him  at  the  feast ;  and 

m  The  reason  why  they  could  not  read  it  was  because  it  was  written  in 
the  old  Hebrew  letters,  now  called  the  Samaritan  chai'acter,  which  the  Ba- 
bylonians knew  nothing  of, 

n  Daniel,  v.  5. 

Vol,  I.  28 


21 S  CO.NNEXlOiN   OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [I'ART   i'» 

therefore  it  must  have   been  Nilocris  the    *iuecn-inother. 
And  she  scemeth  to  have  been   there  called  the  queen,  by 
way  of  eminency,  because  she  had  the  regency  of  the  king- 
dom   under  her  son,   which    her  great  wisdom   eminently 
qualified  her  for.     And  Belshazzar  seemeth  to  have  left  this 
entirely  to  her  management :  for  when  Daniel  was  called  in 
before  him,  he  did  not  know  him,'  though  he  was  one  of  the 
chief  ministers   of  state    that  did  the  king's  business  in  his 
palace,''    but  asked  of  him  v/hether  he  were  Daniel.     But 
Nitocris,  who  constantly  employed  him  in  the  public  affairs  of 
the  kingdom,  knew  him  well,  and  therefore  advised  that  he 
should  be  sent  for  on  this  occasion.     This  shows  Belshazzar 
to  have  been  a  prince  that   wholly  minded   his   pleasures, 
leaving  all  things  else  to  others  to  be  managed  for  him  ;  which 
is  a  conduct  too  often  followed  by  such  princes,  who  think 
kingdoms  made  for  nothing  else  but  to  serve  their  pleasures, 
and  gratify   their  lusts.     And  therefore   that   he  held   the 
crown  seventeen  years,  and  against  so  potent  an   enemy  as 
Cyrus,  was  wholly  owing  to  the  conduct  of  his  mother,  into 
whose  hands  the  management  of  his  affairs  fell :  for  she  was 
a  lady  of  the  greatest  wisdom  of  her  time,  and  did  the  ut- 
most that  could  be  done  to  save  the  state  of  Babylon  from 
ruin.     And  therefore,  her  name  was  long  after  of  that  fame 
in  those  parts,  that  Herodotus  speaks  of  her,  as  if  she  had 
been  sovereign  of  the  kingdom,  in  the  same  manner  as  Semira- 
mis  is  said  to  have  been,  and  attributes  to  her  all  those  works 
about   Babylon   which    other  authors   ascribe   to  her  son.*i 
For,  although  they  were  done  in  his  reign,  it  was  she  that  did 
them,  and  therefore  she  had  the  best  title  to  the  honour  that 
was  due  for  them  ;   though,  as  hath  been  above   hinted,  the 
great  lake,  and  the  canal  leading  to  it  (which,  though  reck- 
oned among  the  works  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  must  at  least 
have  been    finished  by  her,    according  to   Herodotus,)  how 
wisely  soever  tiiey  were  contrived  for  the   benefit  both  of 
the  city  and   country,   turned   to  the  great  damage  of  both  ; 
for  Cyrus,  draining  the  river  by  this  lake  and  canal,  by  that 
means  took  the  city.     And  when,  by   the  breaking  down  of 
the  banks  at  the  head  of  the  canal,  the  river  was  turned  that 
way,  no  care  being  taken  afterward  again  to  reduce  it  to  its 
former  channel,  by   repairing  the   breach,  all  the  country 
on  that   side   was  overflown  and  drowned  by  it ;""  and  the 
current,  by  long  running  this   way,  at   length  making  the 
breach  so  wide  as  to  become  irreparable,  unless    by  an  ex- 
pense as  great  as  that  whereby  the  bank  was  first  built,  a 

o  Daniel  v.  13.  p  Daniel  viii.  27. 

q  Berosus  apud  Joseph,  eontra  Apionem,  lib.  1. 
r  Arriaow  de  Ejspeditlone  Alexandri,  lib.  7. 


UiOOK  II/]  TJ8I:  OLD  ANJD  Sew  TESTAMENTS,  219 

whole  province  was  lost  by  it ;  and  the  current  which  went 
to  Babylon  afterward  grew  so  shallow,  as  to  be  scarce  fit  for 
the  smallest  navigation,  which  was  a  further  damage  to  that 
place.  Alexander,  who  intended  to  have  made  Babylon 
the  seat  of  his  empire,  endeavoured  to  remedy  this  mischief, 
and  did  accordingly  set  himself  to  build  the  bank  anew, 
which  was  on  the  west  side  of  it ;  but  when  he  had  carried 
it  on  the  length  of  four  miles,  he  was  stopped  by  some  difli- 
culties  that  he  met  with  in  the  work  from  the  nature  of  the 
soil,  which  possibly  would  have  been  overcome  had  he 
lived ;  but  his  death,  which  happened  a  little  after,  put  an 
end  to  this,  as  well  as  to  all  his  other  designs.  And,  a  while, 
after,  Babylon  falling  into  decay  on  the  building  of  Seleucia 
in  the  neighbourhood,  this  work  was  never  more  thought  of; 
but  that  country  hath  remained  all  bog  and  marsh  ever 
since.  And  no  doubt  this  was  one  main  reason  which  helped 
forward  the  desertion  of  that  place,  especially  when  they 
found  a  new  city  built  in  the  neighbourhood,  in  a  much  bet- 
ter situation. 

In  the  taking  of  Babylon  ended  the  Babylonish  empire, 
after  it  had  continued  from  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of 
Nabonassar  (who  first  founded  it)  two  hundred  and  nine 
years.  And  here  ended  the  power  and  pride  of  this  great 
city,  just  fifty  years  after  it  had  destroyed  the  city  and  tem- 
ple of  Jerusalem;  and  hereby  were  in  a  great  measure  ac- 
complished the  many  prophecies  which  were,  by  the  pro- 
phets Isaiah,  Jeremiah,  Habakkuk,  and  Daniel,  delivered 
against  it.  And  here  it  is  to  be  observed,  that  in  reference 
to  the  present  besieging  and  taking  of  the  place,  it  was 
particularly  foretold  by  them,  that  it  should  be  shut  up,  and 
besieged  by  the  Medes,  Elamites,  and  Armenians;^  that 
the  river  should  be  dried  up;*  that  the  city  should  be  taken 
in  the  time  of  a  feast,"  while  her  princes  and  wise  men,  her 
captains,  and  her  rulers,  and  her  mighty  men,  were  drunk- 
en ;  and  that  they  should  thereon  be  made  to  sleep  a  per- 
petual sleep,  from  which  they  should  not  awake.  And 
so  accordingly  all  this  came  to  pass,  Belshazzar,  and 
all  his  thousand  princes,  who  were  drunk  with  him  at 
the  feast,  having  been  all  slain  by  Cyrus's  soldiers  when 
they  took  the  palace.^  And  so  also  was  it  particulai- 
ly  foretold  by  the  prophet  Isaiah,  (xiv.)  that  God  would 
make  the  country  of  Babylon  a  possession  for  the  bittern,  and 
pools  of  water,  (ver.  23,)  which  was  accordingly  fulfilled  by 
the  overflowing  and  drowning  of  it,  on  the  breaking  down 
of  the  great  dam,  in  order  to  take  the  city ;  which  1  have 

s  Isa.  xiii.  17  ;  &  xxi.  2,    .Ter.  li.  11,  27—30  t  Jer.  1.  38 ;  &  li.  36, 

II  Jer.  li.  39,  57.  \  Cyropedia,  lib.  7. 


220  CONNEXIOX  OF  THE  HISTORY  Oi  [PART  1. 

above  given  an  account  of;  and  so  also  that  God  would  cut 
off  from  that  city  tJic  son  and  the  grandson,  (ver.  22,)  that 
is,  the  son  and  grandson  of  their  great  king  Nebuchadnez- 
zar ;  and  they  were  accordingly  both  cut  off  by  violent 
deaths  in  the  flower  of  their  age,  Evilmerodach  the  son  be- 
fore this  time,  in  the  manner  as  hath  been  above  related, 
and  Belshazzar  the  grandson  in  the  present  taking  of  Baby- 
lon ;  and  hereby  the  sceptre  of  Babylon  was  broken,  as  was 
foretold  by  the  same  prophecy,  (ver.  5,)  for  it  did  never  af- 
ter any  more  bear  rule.  Where  I  read  the  son  and  the 
grandsoyi,  (ver.  22,)  it  is,  I  confess,  in  the  English  transla- 
tion, the  son  mid  the  nephew.  But,  in  the  twenty-first  chap- 
ter of  Genesis,  (ver.  23,)  the  same  Hebrew  word  Mekcd  is 
translated  son's  son,  and  so  it  ought  to  have  been  translated 
here  ;  for  this  is  the  proper  signification  of  the  word  ;  which 
appears  from  the  use  of  the  same  word,  (Job  xviii.  19,)  for 
Bildad,  there  speaking  of  the  wicked,  and  the  curse  of  God 
•which  shall  be  upon  him,  in  the  want  of  a  posterity,  express- 
eth  it  thus  :  Lo  nin  lo  velo  JS'eked,  i.  e.  he  shall  have  neither 
son  nor  grandson  ;  for  nephew,  in  the  English  signification 
of  the  word,  whether  brother's  son,  or  sister's  son,  cannot 
be  within  the  meaning  of  the  text,  the  context  not  admitting 
it. 

After  the  death  of  Belshazzar,  Darius  the  Mede  is  said  in 

Scripture'^  to  have  taken  the  kingdom  :  for  Cyrus,  as 

Darius  the  long  as  liis  uucle  livcd,  allowed  him  a  joint  title  with 

'  ^  *■  him  in  the  empire,  although  it  was  all  gained  by  his 
own  valour,  and,  out  of  deference  to  him,  yielded  him  the 
first  place  of  honour  in  it.  But  the  whole  power  of  the 
army,  and  the  chief  conduct  of  all  affairs,  being  still  in  his 
hands,  he  only  was  looked  on  as  the  supreme  governor  of  the 
empire  which  he  had  erected ;  and  therefore,  there  is  no 
notice  at  all  taken  of  Darius  in  the  canon  of  Ptolemy,  but, 
immediately  after  the  death  of  Belshazzar  (who  is  there  call- 
ed Nabonadius,)  Cyrusis  placed  as  the  next  successor,  as 
in  truth  and  reality  he  was ;  the  other  having  no  more  than 
the  name  and  the  shadow  of  the  sovereignty,  excepting  only 
in  Media,  which  was  his  own  proper  dominion. 

The  are  some^  who  will  have  Darius  the  Median  to  have 
been  Nabonadius,  the  last  Babylonish  king  in  the  canon  of 
Ptolemy.  And  their  scheme  is,  that  after  the  death  of  Evil- 
merodach, Neriglissar  succeeded  only  as  guardian  to  Labo- 
rosoarchod  his  son,  who  was  next  heir  in  right  of  his  mother, 
she  having  been  daughter  to  Nebuchadnezzar  ;  and  that  La- 
borosoarchod  was  the  Belshazzar  of  the  Scriptures,  who  was 

y  Daniel  v.  3T.  z  Sraliger.  Calvisius.  and  others. 


SOeK  II.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  221 

slain  in  the  night  of  the  impious  festival,  not  by  Cyrus,  (say 
they)  but  by  a  conspiracy  of  his  own  people  :  that  the  Scrip- 
tures attribute  to  him  the  whole  four  years  of  Belshazzar, 
which  the  canon  of  Ptolemy  doth  to  Neriglissar,  (or  Nericas- 
solassar,  as  he  is  there  called,)  because  Neriglissar  reigned 
only  as  guardian  for  him  ;  and  that  hence  it  is,  that  we  hear 
of  the  first  and  the  third  year  of  Belshazzar  in  Daniel,^ 
though  Laborosoarchod  reigned  alone,  after  his  father's 
death,  only  nine  months:  that,  after  his  death,  the  Babylo- 
nians made  choice  of  Nabonadius,  who  was  noway  of  kin  to 
the  family  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  but  a  Median  by  descent; 
and  that  for  this  reason  only  is  he  called  Darius  the  Median 
in  Scripture.  As  to  what  they  say  of  Nabonadius  not  be- 
ing of  kin  to  the  family  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  it  n»ust  be  con- 
fessed, that  the  fragments  of  Megastheftes^  may  give  them 
some  authority  for  it :  but  as  for  all  the  rest,  it  hath  no  other 
foundation  but  the  imagination  of  them  that  say  it.  And 
the  whole  is  contrary  to  Scripture  :  for  1st,  the  handwriting 
on  the  wall  told  Belshazzar,  that  his  kingdom  should  be  di- 
vided, or  rent  from  him,  and  be  given  to  the  Medes  and  Per- 
sians f  and  immediately  after*^  the  sacred  text  tells  us,  that 
Belshazzar  was  slain  that  night,  and  Darius  the  Median  took 
the  kingdom,  who  could  be  none  other  than  Cyaxares,king 
of  Media,  who,  in  conjunction  with  Cyrus  the  Persian,  con- 
quered Babylon.  2dly,  Therefore  Belshazzar  must  have 
been  the  last  Babylonish  king,  and  consequently  the  Nabo- 
nadius of  Ptolemy.  3dly,  This  last  king  was  not  a  stranger 
to  the  family  of  Nebuchadnezzar  ;  for  the  sacred  text  makes 
him  his  descendant.®  4thly,  Darius  is  said  to  have  governed 
the  kingdom  by  the  laws  of  the  Medes  and  Persians  ;^  which 
cannot  be  supposed  till  after  the  Medes  and  Persians  had 
conquered  that  kingdom.  Had  this  Darius  been  Nabonadius 
the  Babylonish  king,  he  would  certainly  have  governed  by 
the  Babylonish  laws,  and  not  by  the  laws  of  his  enemies,  the 
Medes  and  Persians,  who  were  in  hostility  against  him  all  his 
reign,  and  sought  his  ruin-  5thly,  Darius  is  said  to  have  divi- 
ded his  empire  into  one  hundred  and  twenty  provinces,^  whicli 
could  not  have  been  true  of  the  Babylonish  empire,  that 
never  havmg  been  large  enough  for  it.  But  it  must  be  un- 
derstood of  the  Persian  empire  only,  which  was  vastly  lar- 
ger. And  afterward,  on  the  conquest  of  Egypt  by  Camby- 
ses,  and  of  Thrace  and  India  by  Darius  Hystaspes,  it  had 
seven  other  provinces  added  to  its  former  number ;  and 
therefore,  in  the  time  of  Esther,  it  consisted  of  one  hundred 

a  Dan.  vii   1  ;  Si  viii.  1.  b  Apud  Euseb.  Praep.  Evang.  lib.  9. 

c  Dan.  V.  '28.  d  Dan  v.  30,  31. 

e  Dan.  V.  11,  13,  18,  22.         f  Dan.  vi.  8,  15  gDan.vi.  1. 


222  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

and  twenty-seven  provinces.  And  this  having  been  the  di- 
vision of  the  Persian  empire  at  that  time,  it  sufficiently 
proves  the  former  to  have  been  of  the  same  empire  also: 
lor  if  the  Persian  empire  from  hidia  to  F^thiopia  contained 
but  one  hundred  and  twenty-seven  provinces,  the  empire  of 
Babylon  alone,  which  was  not  the  seventh  part  of  the 
other,  could  not  contain  one  hundred  and  twenty.  The 
testimony  which  Scaliger  brings  to  prove  Nabonadius  to 
have  been  a  Mede  by  descent,  and  by  election  made  king  of 
Babylon,  is  ver}  absurd.  In  the  prophecy  of  Nebuchad- 
nezzar, delivered  to  the  Babylonians  a  little  before  his  death, 
concerning  their  future  subjection  to  the  Persians,  which  is 
preserved  in  the  fragments  of  Megasthenes,  there  are  these 
words:''  'A  Persian  mule  shall  come,  who,  by  the  help  of 
your  own  gods  fighting  for  him,  shall  bring  slavery  upon  you, 
whose  assistant,  or  fellow-causer  herein,  shall  be  the  Mede.' 
By  which  Mede  is  plainly  meant  Cyaxares,  king  of  Media, 
who  was  confederate  with  Cyrus  in  the  war  wherein  Baby- 
lon was  conquered.  But  Scaliger  saith  it  was  Nabonadius  ; 
and  hence  proves  that  he  was  a  Mede,  and  quotes  this  place 
in  Megasthenes  for  it.  If  you  ask  him,  why  he  saith  this,  his 
answer  is,  that  the  person,  who  is  in  that  prophecy  said  to 
be  the  assistant  of  Cyrus,  and  fellow-causer  with  him  in 
bringing  servitude  upon  Babylon,  must  be  Nabonadius,  be- 
cause he  was  an  assistant  and  fellow-causer  with  him  herein 
in  being  beaten  and  conquered  by  him.  This  argument 
needs  no  answer ;  it  is  sutficiently  refuted  by  being  related. 
And  therefore  Isaac  Vossius  well  observes,  that  the  argu- 
ments which  Scaliger  brings  for  this  are  indigna  Scaligero 
i.  e.  unworthy  of  Scaliger,     Chronologia  Sacra,  p.  144.  ' 

Af'er  Cyrus  had  settled  his  affairs  at  Babylon,' he  went 
into  Persia,  to  make  a  visit  to  his  father  and  mother,  they 
being  both  yet  living;  and.  on  his  return  through  Media,  he 
there  married  the  daughter  of  Cyaxares,  having  with  her  for 
her  dowry  the  kingdom  of  Media,  in  reversion  after  her  fa- 
ther's death;  for  she  was  his  only  child:  and  then  with  his 
new  wife  he  went  back  to  Babylon.  And  Cyaxares,  being 
earnestly  invited  by  him  thither,  accompanied  him  in  the 
journey.  On  their  arrival  at  Babylon,  they  there  took 
counsel,  in  concert  together,  for  the  settling  of  the  whole 
empire;  and.  having  divided  it  into  the  hundred  and 
twenty  provinces  which  I  have  before  spoken  of,*^  they  dis- 
tributed the  government  of  them  among  those  that  had 
borne  with  Cyrus  the  chief  burden  of  the  war,  and  best  me- 
rited from  him  in  it.'     Over  these  were  appointed  three 

h  Apud  Euseb.  Praep.  Evang.  lib.  9.  i  Cyropedia,  lib.  8. 

k  Dan.vi.  1.  1  Cyropedia,  lih.  P 


BOOK  II. J  THE  OLD  AND  VKW  TESTAMEN'i5.  223 

presidents,™  who,  constantly  residing  at  court,  were  to  re- 
ceive from  them,  from  time  to  time,  an  account  of  all  par- 
ticulars relating  to  their  respective  governments,  and  again 
remit  to  them  the  king's  orders  concerning  them.  And 
therefore,  in  these  three,  as  the  chief  ministers  of  the  king, 
was  intrusted  the  superintendency  and  main  government 
of  the  whole  empire.  And  of  them  Daniel  was  made  the 
tirst.  To  which  preference  not  only  his  great  wisdom 
(which  was  of  eminent  fame  all  over  the  East,)  but  also 
his  seniority,  and  long  experience  in  affairs,  gave  him 
the  justest  title :  for  he  had  now,  from  the  second  year  of 
Nebuchadnezzar,  been  employed  full  sixty-five  years  as  a 
prime  minister  of  state  under  the  kings  of  Babylon.  How- 
ever, this  station  advancing  him  to  be  the  next  person  to  the 
king  in  the  whole  empire,  it  stirred  up  so  great  an  envy 
against  him  among  the  other  courtiers,  that  they  laid  that 
snare  for  him.  which  cast  him  into  the  lion's  den.  But  he 
being  there  delivered  by  a  miracle  from  all  harm,  this  mali- 
cious contrivance  ended  in  the  destruction  of  its  authors  : 
and  Daniel  being  thenceforth  immovably  settled  in  the  fa- 
vour of  Darius  and  Cyrus,"  he  prospered  greatly  in  their 
time,  as  long  as  he  lived. 

In  the  first  year  of  Darius,  Daniel,  computing  that  the 
seventy  years  of  Judah's  captivity,  which  were  prophesied 
of  by  the  prophet  Jeremiah,  were  now  drawing  to  an  end," 
earnestly  prayed  unto  God,  that  he  would  remember  his 
people,  and  grant  restoration  to  Jerusalem,  and  make  his 
face  again  to  shine  upon  the  holy  city,  and  his  sanctuary, 
which  he  had  placed  there.  Whereon,  in  a  vision,  he  had  as- 
surance given  him  by  the  angel  Gabriel,  not  only  of  the  de- 
liverance of  Judah  from  their  temporal  captivity,  under  the 
Babylonians,  but  also  of  a  much  greater  redemption,  which 
God  would  give  his  church  in  his  deliverance  of  them  from 
their  spiritual  captivity  under  sin  and  Satan,  to  be  accomplish- 
ed at  the  end  of  seventy  weeks,  after  the  going  forth  of  the 
commandment  to  rebuild  Jerusalem,  that  is,  at  the  end  of 
four  hundred  and  ninety  )ears.  For,  taking  each  day  for 
a  year,  according  as  is  usual  in  the  prophetic  st_yle  of  Scrip- 
ture, so  many  years  seventy  weeks  of  years  will  amount  to, 
which  is  the  clearest  prophecy  of  the  coming  of  the  Messiah 
that  we  have  in  the  Old  Testament:  for  it  determines  it  to  the 
ver)  time  on  which  he  accordingly  came, and  b}^^  his  death  and 
passion,  and  resurrection  from  the  dead,  completed  for  us 
the  great  work  of  our  salvation. 

Cyrus,  immediately  on  his  return  to  Babylon,  had  issued 
out  his  orders  p  for  all  his  forces  to  come  thither  to  him, 

m  Dan.  vi.  2.  n  Dan,  vi.  28,  o  Dan.  ix. 

p  Cyropedia,  lib.  S. 


2'24  CONNEXION  Of  THE  HISTOKY  OF  [PART   I. 

which,  at  a  general  muster,  he  found  to  be  one  hundred  and 
twenty  tliousand  horse,  two  thousand  scythed  cliariots,  and 
six  hundred  thousand  foot.  Of  these,  having  distributed  into 
garisons  as  many  as  were  neces?ary  for  the  defence  of  the 
several  parts  of  the  empire,  he  marched  with  the  rt-st  in  an 
expedition  into  Syria,  where  he  settled  all  those  parts  of  the 
empire  ;  reducing  all  under  him  as  far  as  the  Red  Sea,  and 
the  confines  of  Ethiopia.  In  the  interim  C^axares  (whoni 
the  Scriptures  call  Darius  the  Median.)  staid  at  Babylon, 
and  there  governed  the  atTairs  of  the  empire,  and  during 
that  time  happened  what  hath  been  above  related  concern- 
ing Daniel's  being  cast  into  the  lions'  den,  and  his  miraculous 
deliverance  from  it.'^ 

And  about  the  same  time,  seem  to  have  been  coined  those 
famous  pieces  of  gold  called  Darics,'  which  by  reason  of  their 
fmeness,  were  for  several  ages  preferred  before  all  other 
coin  throughout  all  the  East:  for  we  are  told  that  the  author 
of  this  coin  was  not  Darius  Hystaspes.  as  some  have  imagin- 
ed, but  an  ancienter  Darius.^  But  there  is  no  ancienter 
Darius  mentioned  to  have  reigned  in  the  East,  excepting 
only  this  Darius  whom  the  Scripture  calls  Darius  the  Me- 
dian. And  therefore  it  is  most  likel},  that  he  was  the  au- 
thor of  this  com,  and  thai  diring  the  two  years  that  he  reign- 
ed at  Babylon,  while  C>rus  was  absent  from  thence  on  his 
Syrian,  Egyptian,  and  other  expeditions,  he  caused  it  to  be 
made  there,  out  of  the  vast  quantity  of  gold  which  had  been 
brought  thither  into  the  treasury,  as  the  spoils  of  the  war 
which  he  and  Cyrus  had  been  so  long  engaged  in ;  from 
whence  it  became  dispersed  all  over  the  East,  and  also  into 
Greece,  where  it  was  of  great  reputation.  According  to 
Dr.  Barnard,*  it  weighed  two  grains  more  than  one  English 
guinea;  but  the  fineness  added  much  more  to  its  value; 
for  it  was  in  a  manner  all  of  pure  gold,  having  none,  or  at 
least  very  little  alloy  in  it;  and  therefore  may  be  well  reck- 
oned, as  the  proportion  of  gold  and  silver  now  stands  with 
us  in  respect  to  each  other,  to  be  worth  twenty-five  shillings 
sterling.  In  those  parts  of  Scripture"  which  were  writ- 
ten after  the  Babylonish  captivity,  these  pieces  are  men- 
tioned by  the  name  of  Adarkonim',  and  in  the  Talmudists 
by  the  name  of  Darkonoth,^  both  from  the  Greek  AxpeiKo],  {.  e. 
Darics.  And  it  is  to  be  observed,  that  all  those  pieces  of 
gold,  which  were  afterward  coined  of  the  same  weight  and 

q  Dan.  v.  31.  r  Herodotus,  lib.  4.    Plutarchus  in  Artaxerxe. 

s  Harpoctation,  Scholiastes  Aristophanis  ad  Eccles.  p.  741,  742.     Suidas 
sub  voce  Aa^jMt. 
t  De  Ponderibus  et  Mensuris  Antiquis,  p,  171. 
u  1  Chron.  xxix.  7 ;  &-  Ezra  viii.  27. 
s  Vide  Bustorfii  Lexicon  Rabinicuni;  p.  577 


BOOK  11. J     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS^  225 

value  by  the  succeeding  kings,  not  only  of  the  Persian  but 
also  of  the  Macedonian  race,  were  all  called  Darics,  from  the 
Darius  that  was  the  first  author  of  them.  And  these  were 
either  whole  Darics  or  half  Darics,  as  with  us  there  are 
guineas  and  half  guineas. 

But,  about  two  years  after,  Cyaxares  dying,  and  Cambyses 
being  also  dead  in  Persia/  Cyrus  returned,  and  took  on  him 
the  whole  government  of  the  empire ;  over  which  he  reign- 
ed seven  years.  His  reign  is  reckoned,  from  his  first  coming 
out  of  Persia,  with  an  army  for  the  assistance  of  Cyaxares, 
to  his  death,  to  have  been  thirty  years ;  from  the  taking  of 
Babylon  nine  years,  and  from  his  being  sole  monarch  of  the 
whole  empire,  after  the  death  of  Cyaxares  and  Cambyses, 
seven  years.  Tully^  reckons  by  the  first  account,  Ptolemy*^ 
by  the  second,  and  Xenophon''  by  the  third.  And  the  first 
of  these  seven  years,  is  that  first  year  of  Cyrus  mentioned 
in  the  first  verse  of  the  book  of  Ezra,  wherein  an  end  was 
put  to  the  captivity  of  Judah,  and  a  license  given  them,  by  a 
public  decree  of  the  king,  again  to  return  into  their  own 
country.  The  seventy  years,  which  Jeremiah  had  prophe- 
sied should  be  the  continuance  of  this  captivity,  were  now 
just  expired  :  for  it  began  a  year  and  two  months  before  the 
death  of  Nabopolassar,  after  that  Nebuchadnezzar  reigned 
forty-three  years,  Evilmerodach  two  years,  Neriglissar  four 
years,  Belshazzar  seventeen  years,  and  Darius  the  Mediaa 
two  years ;  which  being  all  put  together,  make  just  sixty- 
nine  years  and  two  months  ;  and  if  you  add  hereto  ten  months 
more  to  complete  the  said  seventy  years,  it  will  carry  down 
the  end  of  them  exactly  into  the  same  month,  in  the  first 
year  of  Cyrus,  in  which  it  began  in  the  last,  save  one,  of  Na- 
bopolassar, i.  e.  in  the  ninth  month  of  the  Jewish  year,  which 
is  the  November  of  ours.  For  in  that  month  Nebuchadnez- 
zar first  took  Jerusalem,  and  carried  great  numbers  of  the 
people  into  captivity,  as  hath  been  before  related.  And  that 
their  release  from  it  happened  also  in  the  same  month  may 
be  thus  inferred  from  Scripture.  The  first  time  the  Jews 
are  found  at  Jerusalem  after  their  return,  was  in  their  Nisan, 
i.  e.  in  our  April,  as  will  hereafter  be  shown.  If  you  allow 
them  four  months  for  their  march  thither  from  Babylon  (which 
was  the  time  in  which  Ezra  performed  the  like  march,*^)  the 
beginning  of  that  march  will  fall  in  the  middle  of  the  De- 
cember preceding.  And  if  you  allow  a  month's  time  after 
the  decree  of  release  for  their  preparing  for  that  journey,  it 

y  Cyropedia,  lib.  8.  z  De  Divinatione,  lib.  1.  a  In  Canone. 

b  Cyrof)edia,  lib.  8.    Where  Xenophon  saith,  that  Cyrus  reigned  after  the 
death  of  Cyaxares  seven  years, 
c  Ezra  vii.  9. 

Vol.  I.  ?9 


226  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART  I. 

will  fix  the  end  of  the  said  captivity,  which  they  were  then 
released  from,  exactly  in  the  middle  of  the  month  of  Novem- 
ber, in  the  first  year  of  Cyrus  ;  which  was  the  very  time  on 
which  it  began,  just  seventy  years  before.  And  that  this 
first  of  Cyrus  is  not  to  be  reckoned,  with  Ptolemy,  from  the 
taking  of  Babylon,  and  the  death  of  Belshazzar,  but  with 
Xenophon,  from  the  death  of  Darius  the  Mede,  and  the  suc- 
cession of  Cyrus  into  the  government  of  the  whole  empire, 
appears  from  hence,  that  this  last  is  plainly  the  Scripture 
reckoning:  for  therein,  after  the  taking  of  Babylon,  and  the 
death  of  Belshazzar,  Darius  the  Mede ''  is  named  in  the  suc- 
cession before  Cyrus  the  Persian,  and  the  years®  of  the 
reign  of  Cyrus  are  not  there  reckoned,  till  the  years  of  the 
reign  of  Darius  had  ceased  ;  and  therefore,  according  to 
Scripture,  the  first  of  Cyrus  cannot  be  till  after  the  death  of 
Darius. 

There  can  be  no  doubt,  but  that  this  decree  in  favour  of 
the  Jews  was  obtained  by  Daniel.  When  Cyrus  first  came 
into  Babylon,  on  his  taking  the  city,  he  found  him  there  an 
old  minister  of  state,  famed  for  his  great  wisdom  all  over  the 
East,  and  long  experienced  in  the  management  of  the  public 
affairs  of  the  government ;  and  such  counsellors  wise  kings 
always  seek  for:  and  moreover,  his  late  reading  of  the  won- 
derful handwriting  on  the  wall,  which  had  puzzled  all  the 
wise  men  of  Babylon  besides,  and  the  event  which  hap- 
pened immediately  after,  exactly  agreeable  to  his  interpre- 
tation, had  made  a  very  great  and  fresh  addition  to  his  repu- 
tation ;  and  therefore,  on  Cyrus's  having  made  himself  mas- 
ter of  the  city,  he  was  soon  called  for,  as  a  person  that  was 
best  able  to  advise,  and  direct  about  the  settling  of  the  go- 
vernment on  this  revolution,  and  was  consulted  with  in  all 
the  measures  taken  herein.  On  which  occasion,  he  so  well 
approved  himself,  that  afterward,  on  the  settling  of  the  go- 
vernment of  the  whole  empire,  he  was  made  first  superin- 
tendent, or  prime  minister  of  state,  over  all  the  provinces 
of  it,  as  hath  been  already  shown  :  and  when  Cyrus  return- 
ed from  his  Syrian  expedition  again  to  Babylon,  he  found  a 
new  addition  to  his  fame,  from  his  miraculous  deliverance 
from  the  lions'  den.  All  which  put  together  gave  sufficient 
reason  for  that  wise  and  excellent  prince  to  have  him  in  the 
highest  esteem  ;  and  therefore  it  is  said,  that  he  prospered 
under  him,  as  he  did  under  Darius  the  Median,  with  whom, 
it  appears,  he  was  in  the  highest  favour  and  esteem. '^  And 
since  he  had  been  so  earnest  with  God  in  prayer  for  the 

d  Dan.  vi.  28.  e  Compare  Dan.  ix.  1,  with  x.  1 

f  Dan.  i,21:anclvi.26, 


BOOK  II.J  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  227 

restoration  of  his  people,  as  we  find  in  the  ninth  chapter  of 
Daniel,  it  is  not  to  be  thought  that  he  was   backward  in  his 
intercessions  for  it  with  the  king,  especially  when  he  was  in 
so  great  favour,  and  of  so  great  authority   with  him.     And, 
to  induce  him   the  readier  to  grant  his  request,  he  showed 
him   the  prophecies  of  the  prophet  Isaiah,  =which  spake   of 
him    by  name  one  hundred   and  fifty  years  before  he   was 
born,  as  one  whom  God  had  designed  to  be  a  great  conqueror, 
and  king   over  many  nations,  and  the  restorer   of  his  peo- 
ple, in  causing  the  temple  to  be  built,  and  the  land  of  Judah 
and  the  city  of  Jerusalem  to  be  again  dwelt  in  by  its  former 
inhabitants.     That  Cyrus  had  seen  and  read  these  prophe- 
cies, Josephus  tells  us  ;''  ,and  it  is  plain  from  Scripture  that 
he  did  so  ;  for  they  are  recited  in  his  decree  in  Ezra  for  the 
rebuilding  of  the  temple.'     And  who  was  there  that  should 
show  them  unto  him  but  Daniel,  who,  in  the  station  that  he 
was  in,  had  constant  access  unto  him,  and  of  all  men  living 
had  it  most  at  heart  to  see  these  prophecies  fulfilled,  in  the 
restoration  of  Sion  ?  Besides,  Cyrus,  in  his  late  expedition 
into   Syria  and   Palestine,  having  seen  so   large  and  good  a 
country  as  that  of  Judea  lie  wholly  desolate,  might  justly  be 
moved  with  a  desire   of  having  it  again   inhabited ;   for  the 
strength  and  riches  of  every  empire  being  chiefly  in  the  num- 
ber of  its  subjects,  no  wise  prince  would  ever  desire  that  any 
part  of  his  dominions  should  lie  unpeopled.     And  who  could 
be  more  proper  again  to  plant  the  desolated  country  of  Ju- 
dea than  its  former  inhabitants  ?  They  were  first  carried  out 
of  Judea  by  Nebuchadnezzar  to  people  and  strengthen  Ba- 
bylon ;  and  perchance  under  this  government  of  the  Persians, 
to  which    the  Babylonians    were  never  well  affected,  the 
weakening  and  dispeopling  of  Babylon  might  be  as  strong  a 
reason  for  their  being  sent  back  again  into  their  own  coun- 
try.     But  whatsoever  second  causes  worked  to  it,  God's 
overruling  power,  which  turneth  the  hearts  of  princes  which 
way  he  pleaseth,  brought  it  to  pass,  that  in  the  first  year  of 
Cyrus's  monarchy  over  the  East,  he  issued  out  his  royal  de- 
cree for  the  rebuilding  of  the  temple  at    Jerusalem,  and 
the   return   of  the    Jews    again   into   their    own    country. 
And  herein  the  state  of  Judah  and  Jerusalem  began  to  be 
restored  ;  of  which  an  account  will  be  given  in   the  next 
book. 

gisa.  xliv.  28,  and  xiv.  1.  h  Lib.  ll,c.  1.  iEzrai.2. 


iHt 


OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS 

CONNECTED,  &lc. 


BOOK  III. 

Cyrus''  having  issued  out  his  decree  for  the  restoring  of 
the  Jews  unto  their  own  land,  and  the  rebuilding  of 
CyruH'.  ^^^  temple  at  Jerusalem,  they  gathered  together  out 
of  the  several  parts  of  the  kingdom  of  Babylon,  to  the 
number  of  forty-two  thousand  three  hundred  and  sixty  per- 
sons, with  their  servants,  which  amounted  to  seven  thousand 
three  hundred  and  thirty-seven  more. 

Their  chief  leaders  were  Zerubbabel,^  the  son  of  Sala- 
thiel,  the  son  of  Jehoiachin,  or  Jeconias,  king  of  Judah,  and 
Jeshua,  the  son  of  Jozadak,  the  high-priest.  Zerubbabel 
(whose  Babylonish  name  was  Sheshbazzar*^)  was  made  go- 
vernor of  the  land,  under  the  title  of  Tirshatha,  by  commis- 
sion from  Cyrus.''  But  Jeshua  was  high-priest  by  lineal 
descent  from  the  pontifical  family ;  for  he  was  the  son  of 
Jozadak,  who  was  the  son  of  Seraiah,  that  was  high-priest 
■when  Jerusalem  was  destroyed,  and  the  temple  burned  by 
the  Chaldeans. '^  Seraiah,  being  then  taken  prisoner  by  Ne- 
buzaradan,  and  carried  to  Nebuchadnezzar  to  Riblah  in 
Syria,  was  then  put  to  death  by  him  'J  but  Jozadak  his  son, 
being  spared  as  to  his  life,°  was  only  with  the  rest  led  cap- 
tive to  Babylon,  where  he  died  before  the  decree  of  resto- 
ration came  forth  ;  and  therefore  the  office  of  high-priest 
was  then  in  Jeshua  his  son,  and  under  that  title  he  is  named,^ 
next  Zerubbabel,  among  the  first  of  those  that  returned. 
The  rest  were  Nehemiah,  Seraiah,  Reelaiah,  Mordecai,  Bil- 
«han,  Mizpar,  Bigvai,  Rheum,  and  Baanah,'  who  were  the 
prime  leaders  of  the  people,  and  the  chief  assistants  to  Ze- 


a  Ezra  i;  &i  ii.  b  Ezra  ii.  2. 

c  Ezra  i.  8,  11.  t|  F^zra  v.  14. 

«  1  Chron.  vi.  14,  15.  l  2  Kings  xxv.  IS. 

2  1  Chron.  vi.  15.  h  Ezra  ii.  2  :  iii.  2.    Hag.  i.  12  :  ii.  2. 

fEzraii.2,     Neh.  vii.  T. 


BOOK  III.]  THE  OLD  AN'D  XEW  TESTAMENTS.  229 

mbbabel,  in  the  resettling  of  them  again  in  their  own  land, 
and  are  by  the  Jewish  writers  reckoned  the  chief  men  of  the 
great  synagogue ;  so  they  call  the  convention  of  elders, 
"which,  they  say,  sat  at  Jerusalem  after  the  return  of  the 
Jews,  and  did  there  again  re-establish  all  their  affairs  both 
as  to  church  and  state,  of  which  they  speak  great  things,  as 
shall  hereafter  be  shown.  But  it  is  to  be  observed,  that  the 
Nehemiah  and  Mordecai  above  mentioned,  were  not  the 
Nehemiah  and  Mordecai,  of  whom  there  is  so  much  said  in 
the  books  of  Nehemiah  and  Esther,  but  quite  diiferent  per- 
sons who  bore  the  same  name. 

At  the  same  time  that  Cyrus  issued  out  his  decree  for  the 
rebuilding  of  the  temple  at  Jerusalem,  he  ordered  all  the 
vessels  to  be  restored  which  had  been  taken  from  thence.'' 
Nebuchadnezzar,  on  the  burning  of  the  former  temple,  had 
brought  them  to  Babylon,  and  placed  them  there  in  the  tem- 
ple of  Bel  his  god.  From  thence  they  were,  according  to 
Cyrus's  order,  by  Mithredath,  the  king's  treasurer,  delivered 
to  Zerubbabel,  who  carried  them  back  again  to  Jerusalem. 
All  the  vessels  of  gold  and  silver  that  were  at  this  time  re- 
stored were  tive  thousand  four  hundred  ;  the  remainder  was 
brought  back  by  Ezra,  in  the  reign  of  Artaxerxes  Longima- 
nus,  many  years  after. 

And  not  only  those  of  Judah  and  Benjamin,  but  several 
also  of  the  other  tribes,  took  the  benefit  of  this  decree  to 
return  again  into  their  own  land;  for  some  of  them  who 
were  carried  away  by  Tiglath  Pileser,  Salmanezer,  and  Esar- 
haddon,'  still  retained  the  true  worship  of  God  in  a  strange 
land,  and  did  not  go  into  the  idolatrous  usages  and  impieties 
of  the  heathens  among  whom  they  were  dispersed,  but  join- 
ed themselves  to  the  Jews,  when,  by  a  like  captivity,  they 
were  brought  into  the  same  parts;  and  some,  after  all  the 
Assyrian  captivities,  were  still  left  in  the  land.  For  we 
find  some  of  them  still  there  in  the  time  of  Josiah,"" 
and  they  suffered  the  Babylonish  captivity,  as  well  as  the 
Jews,  till  at  length  they  were  wholly  carried  away  in  the  last 
of  them  by  Nebuzaradan,  in  the  twenty-third  year  of  Nebu- 
chadnezzar." And  many  of  them  had  long  before'  left  their 
tribes  for  their  religion,  and,  incorporating  themselves  with 
their  brethren  of  Judah  and  Benjamin,  dwelt  in  their  cities, 
and  there  fell  into  the  same  calamity  with  them  in  their  cap- 
tivity under  the  Babylonians.  And  of  all  these  a  great  num- 
ber took  the  advantage  of  this  decree  again  to  return  and 

kEzrai.  7— 11.  1  Tobit  i.  11,  12;  &  xiv.  9. 

m  2  Chron.  xxxiv.  9  ;  xxxv.  18.  n  Jer.  lii.  30. 

o  2  Clirop.  xi.  16  :  xv.  9  ;  xxxi.  0. 


230  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OP  [PART  I. 

dwell  in  their  own  cities  ;  for  both  Cyrus's  decree,  as  well 
as  that  of  Artaxerxes,  extended  to  all  the  house  of  Israel. 
The  decree  of  Artaxerxes  is,  by  the  name,  to  all  the  people 
of  Israel,P  and  that  of  Cyrus  is  to  all  the  people  of  the  God 
of  Israel,i  that  is,  as  appears  by  the  text,  to  all  those  that 
worshipped  God  at  Jerusalem,  which  must  be  understood 
of  the  people  of  Israel,  as  well  as  of  Judah  :  for  that  temple 
was  built  for  both,  and  both  had  an  equal  right  to  worship 
God  there.  And  therefore  Ezra,  when  he  returned,  in  the 
reign  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus/  sent  a  copy  of  the  king's 
decree,  whereby  that  favour  was  granted  him  through 
all  Media,  where  the  ten  tribes  were  in  captivity,  as  well  as 
through  all  Chaldca  and  Assyria,  where  the  Jews  were  in 
captivity  ;  which  plainly  implies,  that  both  of  them  were  in- 
cluded in  that  decree,  and  that  being  a  renewal  of  the  de- 
cree of  Cyrus,  both  must  be  understood  of  the  same  extent. 
And  we  are  told  in  Scripture,-  that,  after  the  captivity, 
some  of  the  children  of  Ephraim  and  Manasseh  dwelt  in 
Jerusalem,  as  well  as  those  of  Judah  and  Benjamin.  Audit 
appears  from  several  places  in  the  New  Testament,*  that 
some  of  all  the  tribes  were  still  in  being  among  the  Jews, 
even  to  the  time  of  their  last  dispersion  on  the  destruction 
of  Jerusalem  by  the  Romans,  though  then  all  w  ere  compre- 
hended under  the  name  of  Jews,  which,  after  the  Babylo- 
nish captivity,  became  the  general  name  of  the  whole  na- 
tion, as  that  of  Israelites  was  before.  And  this  being  pre- 
mised, it  solves  the  difficulty  which  ariseth  from  the  differ- 
ence that  is  between  the  general  number,  and  the  particu- 
lars of  those  that  returned  upon  Cyrus's  decree.  For  the 
general  number  both  in  Ezra  and  Nehemiah,  is  said  to  be 
forty-two  thousand  three  hundred  and  sixty  ;  but  the  parti- 
culars, as  reckoned  up  in  their  several  families  in  Ezra, 
amount  only  to  twenty-nine  thousand  eight  hundred  and  eigh- 
teen, and  in  Nehemiah,  to  thirty-one  thousand  and  thirty- 
one.  The  meaning  of  which  is,  they  arc  only  the  tribes  of 
Judah,  Benjamin,  and  Levi,  that  are  reckoned  by  their  fami- 
lies in  both  these  places,"  the  rest,  being  of  the  other  tribes 
of  Israel,  are  numbered  only  in  the  gross  sum,  and  this  is 
that  which  makes  the  gross  sum  so  much  exceed  the  parti- 
culars in  both  the  computations.  But  how  it  comes  to  pass, 
that  the  particulars  in  Ezra  differ  from  the  particulars  in  Ne- 
hemiah, since  there  are  several  ways  how  this  may  be  ac- 

p  Ezra  vii.  13.  q  Ezra  i.  3. 

r  Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  1 1,  c.  5.  si  Chron.  is.  3 

t  Luke  ii.  36.     James  i.  1.     Acts  xxvi.  7. 
II  SeHer  Olam  Rabha,  c.  29. 


BOOK  III.j  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  231 

counted  for,  and  we  can  only  conjecture  which  of  them  may 
be  the  right,  I  shall  not  take  upon  me  to  determine. 

Of  the   twenty-four  courses  of  the  priests  that  were  car- 
ried   away  to  Babylon,  only  four  returned,^  and  they  were 
the   courses  of  Jedaiah,  Immer,  Pashur,  and  Harim,  which 
made   up   the  number  of   four  thousand   two   hundred   and 
eighty-nine  persons.     The  rest  either  tarried  behind  or  were 
extinct.      However,  the  old  number  of  the  courses,  as  esta- 
blished by  king  David,  were  still  kept  up.     For,  of  the  four 
courses  that  returned,^  each  subdivided  themselves  into  six, 
and  the  new  courses  taking  the  names  of  those  that  were 
wanting,  still  kept   up  the  old  titles;    and   hence  it  is,  that 
after  this  Mattathias   is  said  to  have  been  of  the  course  of 
Joarib,^  and  Zecharias  of  the  course  of  Abia,^  though  neither 
of  these  courses  were  of  the  number  of  those  that  returned. 
For  the  new  courses  took  the  names  of  the  old  ones,  though 
they  were  not  descended  from  them,  and  so  they  were  coutinuc'd 
by  the  same  names  under  the  second  temple,  as  tbe^  had 
been  under  the  tirst,  only  the  fifth  course,  though  of  tne  num- 
ber of  these  that  returned,  changed  its  name,  and  for  that  of 
Malchijah,   under  which   it  was  first  established,   took   the 
nam.e  of  Pashur,  that  is,  the  name  of  the  son  instead  of  that 
of  the  father ;    for  Pashur  was  the  son  of  Malchijah.*'     It  is 
a  common  saying  among  the  Jews,  that  they  were  only  the 
bran,*^  that  is,  the  dregs  of  the  people,  that  returned  to  Jeru- 
salem after  the  end  of  the  captivity,  and   that  all   the  fine 
flour  staid  behind  at  Babylon.     It  is  most  certain,  that,  not- 
withstanding  the   several   decrees  that  had  been  granted  by 
the  kings  of  Persia  for  the  return  of  the  Jews  into  their  own 
land,  there  were  a  great  many  that  waived  taking  the  advan- 
tage of  them,  and   continued  still  in  Chaldea,  Assyria,  and 
other  Eastern  provinces,  where  they  had  been  carried  ;  and 
it  is  most  likely,  that  they  were  of  the  best  and  richest  of 
the  nation  that  did  so  :  for,  when  they  had  gotten  houses  and 
lands  in  those  parts,  it  cannot  be  supposed,  that  such  would 
be    very  forward  to  leave  good  settlements  to  new-plant  a 
country  that  had  lain  many  years    desolate.     But  of  what 
sort  soever  they  were,  it  is  certain  a  great  many  staid  be- 
hind, and  never  again  returned  into  their  own  country.     And 
if  we  may  guess  at  their  number,  by  the  family  of  Aaron, 
they  must  have   been  man}    more  than   those   who  settled 
again  in  Judea ;  for  of  the  twenty-four  courses  of  the  sons  of 
Aaron,  which  were  carried  away,  we  find  only  four  among 
those   that  returned,  as  hath  been  already  taken  notice  of: 

X  Ezra  ii.  36—39.        y  Talmud.  Hierosol.  in  Taanith.  z  1  Mac  ii.  1. 

a  Luke  i.  5.  h  1  Chron.  ix.  12.     Nebetn.  si.  12 

<•  Talmud  Bab.  in  Kiddushim 


'232  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OF  [PART  1. 

and  hereb_y  it  came  to  pass,  that,  during  all  the  time  of  the 
second  temple,  and  for  a  great  many  ages  after,  the  number 
of  the  Jews  in  Chaidea,  Assyria,  and  Persia,  grew  to  be  so 
very  great,  that  they  were  all  along  thought  to  exceed  the 
number  of  the  Jews  at  Palestine,  even  in  those  times  when 
that  country  was  best  inhabited  by  them. 

Those    who   made   this  first    return  into  Judea,    arrived 

there  in  Nisan,  the  first  month  of  the  Jewish  year, 
Cyriw2.  (which  answcrs  to  part  of  March  and  part  of  April  in 

our  calendar,)  for  the  second  month  of  the  next 
year  is  said  to  be  in  the  second  year  after  their  return  ;'' 
and  therefore,  they  must  then  have  been  a  whole  year  in 
the  land.  As  soon  as  they  came  thither,®  they  dispersed 
themselves  according  to  their  tribes,  and  the  families  of 
their  fathers,  into  their  several  cities,  and  there  betook 
themselves  to  rebuild  their  houses,  and  again  manure  their 
lands,  after  they  had  now,  from  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem, 
and  the  flight  of  the  remainder  of  the  people  into  Egypt,  on 
the  death  of  Gedaliah,  lain  desolate  and  uncultivated  fifty- 
two  years,  according  to  the  number  of  the  sabbatical  years, 
which  they  had  neglected  to  observe  ;  for,  according  to  the 
Mosaical  law,  tliey  ought  to  have  left  their  lands  fallow 
every  seventh  year/  But,  among  other  commandments  of 
God,  this  also  they  had  neglected  :  and  therefore,  God  made 
the  land  lie  desolate  without  inhabitants  or  cultivation,  till 
it  had  enjoyed  the  full  number  of  its  sabbaths  that  it  had 
been  deprived  of.^  And  this  tells  us  how  long  the  Jews 
had  neglected  this  law  of  the  sabbatical  year  ;  for  it  is  cer- 
tain, the  land  was  desolated  only  lifty-two  years,  that  is, 
from  the  death  of  Gedaliah  till  the  end  of  the  seventy  years 
captivity,  in  the  first  year  of  the  empire  of  Cyrus.  And 
fifty-two  sabbatical  years  make  fifty-two  weeks  of  years, 
which  amount  to  three  hundred  and  sixty-four  years  ;  which 
carries  up  the  computation  to  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of 
Asa  ;  and  therefore,  from  that  time  the  Jews  having  neg- 
lected to  observe  the  sabbatical  years,  till  they  had  deprived 
the  land  of  fifty-two  of  them,  God  made  that  land  lie  deso- 
late, without  cultivation  or  inhabitants,  just  so  many 
years,  till  he  had  restored  to  it  that  full  rest,  which  the 
wickedness  of  its  inhabitants  had,  contrary  to  the  law  of 
their  God,  denied  unto  it.  If  we  reckon  the  whole  seventy 
years  of  the  captivity  into  those  years  of  desolation,  which 
were  to  make  amends  for  the  sabbatical  years  that  the  land 
had  been  deprived  of,  then  we  must  reckon  the  observation 

d  Ezra  iii.  8. 

e  Ezra  ii.  1 ;  ii.  70  ;  iii.  1.     Neh.  vii.  d.  f  Lev.  xxv.  2 — 4. 

g  Lev.xxvi.  34. 35;  43.    2  Cbron.  xxxvi.  21, 


o 


'BOOK  m.j  THJE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMEiVTa.  233 

of  them  to  have  been  laid  aside  for  seventy  weeks  of  years, 
that  is,  four  hundred  and  ninety  years.  But  this  will  carry 
back  the  omission  higher  up  than  the  days  of  David  and 
Samuel,  in  whose  time  it  is  not  likely  that  such  a  breach  of 
the  law  of  God  would  have  been  permitted  in  the  land. 

On  the  seventh  month,  which  is  called  the  month  Tisri,  all 
the  people  which  had  returned  to  their  several  cities  gathered 
together  at  Jerusalem,*^  and  there,  on  the  first  day  of  that 
month,  celebrated  the  feast  of  trumpets.'  This  month  began 
about  the  time  of  the  autumnal  equinox,  and  was  formerly'- 
the  first  month  of  the  year,  till  it  was  changed  at  the  time  of 
the  coming  up  of  the  children  of  Israel  out  of  Egypt ;'  for 
that  happened  in  the  month  of  Abib,  afterward  called  Nisan, 
that  month,  for  this  reason,  had  the  honour  given  it,  as  thence- 
forth to  be  reckoned  among  the  Israelties  for  the  first  month 
of  the  year,  that  is,  in  all  ecclesiastical  matter?.  Before 
this  time  Tisri""  was  reckoned  every  where  to  begin  the  year, 
because  from  thence  did  commence  (it  was  thought)  the  be- 
ginning of  all  things ;"  it  being  the  general  opinion  among- 
the  ancients,  that  the  world  was  created,  and  first  began,  at 
the  time  of  the  autumnal  equinox.  And  for  this  reason  th& 
Jews  do  still,  in  their  era  of  the  creation  of  the  world,  as 
well  as  in  their  era  of  contracts,  compute  the  beginning  of 
the  year  from  the  first  of  Tisri,  and  all  their  bills,  and  bonds, 
and  all  other  civil  acts  and  contracts,  are  still  dated  amon-r 
them  according  to  the  same  computation.  And  from  this 
month  also  they  began  all  their  jubilees  and  sabbatical  years.* 
And  therefore,  although  their  ecclesiastical  year  began  froiu 
Nisan,  and  all  their  festivals  were  reckoned  according  to  it, 
yet  their  civil  year  was  still  reckoned  from  Tisri,  and  the  first 
day  of  that  month  was  their  new-year's-day,  and  for  thei 
more  solemn  celebration  of  it,  this  feast  of  trumpets  seems 
to  have  been  appointed. 

On  the  tenth  day  of  the  same  month  was  the  great  day  of 
expiation,^  when  the  high-priest  made  atonement  for  all  the 
people  of  Israel ;  and  on  the  fifteenth  day  began  the  feast  of 
tabernacles,  and  lasted  till  the  twenty-second  inclusively."- 
During  all  which  solemnities,  the  people  staid  at  Jerusalem, 
and  employed  all  that  time  to  the  best  of  their  power  to  set 
forward  the  restoration  of  God's  worship  again  in  that  place  ; 
toward  which  all  that  had  riches  contributed  according  to 

hEzraiii.l.  i  Ezra  iii.  G.     Lev.  xxiii.  24.     Num.  sxix.  1, 

k  Ex.  xxiii.  16;  xxxiv.  22.  1  Exod.  sii.  2, 

m  Chaldee  Paraphrast  on  Exodus  xii.  2. 

n  Vide  Scaligerum   de  Emendatione   Temporum,  lib.  5,  c    De  Condltu 
Mundi,  p.  366,  fcc.  o  Lav.  xxv.  9 

p  Lev.  xvi.  29,  30  ;  xxiii.  27.     Num.  xxis.  7 
q  Lev.  xxiii.  34     ^'um.  Tsir,  12,  fee. 
VoLs    h  SO 


234  CONNEXIO:^  op  the  history  of  [part   fi 

(heir  abilities.  And  tlie  free-will  offerings  which  were 
made  on  this  occasion,  besides  one  hundred  vestments  for  the 
priests,  amounted  to  sixty-one  thousand  drachms  of  gold,  and 
five  thousand  minas  of  silver,''  which  in  all  comes  to  about 
seventy-five  thousand  five  hundred  pounds  of  our  money; 
for  every  drachm  of  gold  is  worth  ten  shillings  of  our  money, 
and  every  mina  of  silver  nine  pounds ;  for  it  contained  sixty 
shekels,'  and  every  shekel  of  silver  is  worth  of  our  money 
three  shillings. '^  And  upon  this  fund  they  began  the  work. 
And  a  great  sum  it  was  to  be  raised  by  so  small  a  number  of 
people,  and  on  their  first  return  from  their  captivity,  espe- 
cially if  they  were  only  of  the  poorer  sort,  as  the  Rabbins 
say.  It  must  be  supposed,  that  these  offerings  were  made  by 
(he  whole  nation  of  the  Jews,  that  is,  by  those  who  staid 
behind,  as  well  as  by  those  who  returned  :  otherwise  it  is 
scarce  possible  to  solve  the  matter  ;  for  all  having  an  equal 
interest  in  that  temple,  and  the  daily  sacrifices  there  offered 
up  having  been  in  the  behalf  of  all,  it  is  very  reasonable  to 
suppose,  that  all  did  contribute  to  the  building  of  it ;  and  that 
especially  seeing  that,  as  long  as  that  temple  stood,  every 
Jew  annually  paid  an  half  shekel,"  ?".  e.  about  eighteen  pence 
of  our  money,  towards  its  repair,  and  the  support  of  the  daily 
service  in  it,  into  what  parts  soever  they  were  dispersed 
through  the  whole  world. 

The  first  thing  Ihcy  did,  was  to  restore  the  altar  of  the 
Lord  for  burnt-offerings.''  This  stood  in  the  middle  of  the 
inner  court  of  the  temple,  exactly  before  the  porch  leading 
into  the  holy  place  ;^  and  hereon  were  made  the  daily  offer- 
ings of  the  morning  and  evening  service,  and  all  other  offer- 
ings, ordinary  and  extraordinary,  which  were  offered  up  to 
God  by  fire.  It  had  been  beaten  down  and  destroyed  by  the 
Babylonians  at  (he  burning  of  the  temple,  and  in  the  same 
place  was  it  now  again  restored.  That  it  was  built,  and  stood 
in  another  place,  with  a  tabernacle  round  it,  till  the  rebuild- 
ing of  the  temple  was  fully  finshed  and  completed,  is  a  fancy 
without  a  fouiulation.'^  It  was  certainly  built  in  its  proper 
place,^  that  is,  in  the  same  place  where  it  before  stood,  and 
(here  they  daily  offered  sacrifices  upon  it,  even  before  any 
thing  else  of  the  temple  was  built  upon  it.  It  was  a  large  pile 
built  all   of  unhewn  stones,*^  thirty-two   cubits  (i.  e.  forty- 

r  Ezraii.  fi9.  s  Ezek.  xlv.  12. 

t  VideBernardum  de  Mensnris  et  Ponderibus  antiqui3,p.  129. 

11  Exod.  XXX.  13 — 15.     Maiinonides  in  Shekalim,  cap.  1,2,4. 

X  Ezra  iii.  3.  y  See  Lightfoot  of  the  temple,  chap.  34 

z  Bishop  Patrick  in  his  comtnenl  on  1  Chron.  chap.  ix. 

a  Ezra  iii.  2.  For  there  it  is  said,  that  they  did  set  the  altar  upon  its  ba- 
ses or  foundations,  i.  e.  upon  the  same  bases  or  foundations  on  which  it 
before  had  stuod. 

bJVIisnainth  in  Xfirldotii      Mainionides  in  Beth  Hnbl)echira,  c,  1.2. 


BOOK  I  U.J  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  i235 

eight  feet)  square  at  the  bottom  ;  from  thence  it  rising  one 
cubit  benched  in  one  cubit;  and  from  thence,  being  thirty 
cubits  square,  it  did  rise  five  cubits,  and  benched  in  one  cu- 
bit; and  from  thence  being  twenty-eight  cubits  square,  it 
did  rise  three  cubits,  and  benched  in  two  cubits  ;  from  whence 
it  did  rise  one  cubit,  which  was  the  hearth,  upon  which  the 
ofTerings  were  burned,  and  the  benching  in  of  two  cubits 
breadth  was  the  passage  round  it,  on  which  the  priests  stood, 
when  they  tended  the  fire,  and  placed  the  sacrifices  on  it. 
So  this  hearth  was  a  square  of  twenty-four  cubits,  or  thirty- 
six  feet,  on  every  side,  and  one  cubit  high,  which  was  all  made 
of  solid  brass,  and  from  hence  it  was  called  the  brazen  altar.'' 
For  it  is  not  to  be  imagined,  that  it  was  all  made  of  solid 
brass  ;  for  to  make  up  so  big  a  pile  all  of  that  mclal  would 
cost  a  vast  sum  of  money.  And  besides,  if  it  were  so  made, 
it  would  not  only  be  against  the  law,  but  also  impracticable 
for  the  use  intended.  It  would  be  against  the  law,  because 
thereby  they  are  commanded,  that  wheresoever  they  should 
make  an  altar,  other  than  the  portable  altar  of  the  taberna- 
cle, they  should  make  it  of  earth,  or  else  of  unhewn  stone.'" 
And  it  would  be  impracticable  for  the  use  intended,  because, 
if  it  were  all  of  brass,  the  fire  continually  burning  upon  the 
top  of  it  would  so  heat  the  whole,  and  especially  that  part  of 
it  next  the  hearth,  that  it  wouldbe  impossible  for  the  priests  to 
stand  on  it,  when  they  were  come  thitherto  othciate  in  tending 
the  altar,  and  offering  the  sacrifices  thereon  ;  and  that  espe- 
cially since  they  were  always  to  officiate  barefooted,  without 
any  thing  at  all  upon  their  feet  to  fence  them  from  the  heat 
of  it.  It  is  not  indeed  any  where  commanded,  that  the 
priests  should  officiate  barefooted  ;  but  among  the  gartnents 
assigned  for  the  priests  (Exod.  xxviii.)  shoes  not  being  named, 
they  were  supposed  therefore  to  be  forbid,  and  the  text  say- 
ing, (ver.  4,)  these  are  the  garments  rohich  they  shall  ;/m/i'?,  this 
(they  say)  excludes  all  that  are  not  there  named.  And  Moses 
being  commanded,  at  the  burning  bush,°  to  put  off  his  shoes, 
for  that  the  ground  on  which  he  stood  was  holy,  because  of 
the  extraordinary  presence  of  God  then  in  that  place  ;  this 
they  make  a  further  argument  for  it  :  for,  say  they,  the  tem- 
ple was  all  holy  for  the  same  reason,  that  is,  because  of  (he 
extraordinary  presence  of  God  there  residing  in  Shechinah 
over  the  mercy-seat.  And  for  these  reasons  it  was  most 
strictly  exacted,  that  the  priest  should  be  always  barefooted 
in  the  temple,  although  their  going  there  with  their  bare  feet 
upon  the  marble  pavement  was  very  pernicious  to  the  health 
of  many  of  them.     On  the  four  corners  of  the  altar,  on  the 

c  1  Kings  viii.  64.         ^  d  Exod.  «jt.  24.  25. 

e  Exod.  iii.  5      .\c(i?  vfi.  33. 


236  COXXEXION  OS  THE  HISTORY  OF  [I'ARl   i. 

last  benching  in,  where  the  priests  stood  when  they  oflered 
the  sacrifices,  there  were  fixed  four  snnall  pillars  of  a  cubit 
height,  and  a  cubit  on  every  side,  in  the  form  of  an  exact 
cube.  And  these  were  the  horns  of  the  altar  so  often  men- 
tioned in  Scripture.  The  middle  of  each  of  them  was  hol- 
low, because  therein  was  to  be  put  some  of  the  blood  of  the 
sacrifices.  The  ascent  up  to  the  altar  was  by  a  gentle  rising 
on  the  south  side,  called  the  Kibbesh,  which  was  thirty- 
two  cubits  in  length,  and  sixteen  in  breath,  and  landed  upon 
the  upper  benching  in  next  the  hearth,  or  the  top  of  the 
altar;  for  to  go  up  to  the  altar  by  steps  was  forbidden  by  the 
Jaw/ 

But  their  zeal  for  the  temple*  being  that  which  had  brought 

most  of   them  back  again  into  Judea,  the  rebuilding 

Cyruses,  o^  ^^^^^   was  what  they  had  their  hearts  most  intent 

upon.     And  therefore  having  employed  the  first  year^ 

*  Jin  Explanation  of  the  Ichnographj  of  I  he  Temple  cf  Jerusa- 
lem, 

AAAA  The  outer  wall  of  the  Temple,  wiiicii  was  a  square  of  five  Iiuii- 
tlred  cubits  on  every  side,  i.  e.  two  tliousand  in  the  wliole  circuit.  It  was 
twenty-five  cubits  high,  measuring  on  the  inside,  which  was  tlie  size  of  all 
■other  the  walls  of  the  temple,  as  well  in  the  inner  part  as  the  ontcr,  e^scept- 
ing  only  that  of  the  Chcl ;  every  cubit  was  a  foot  and  an  half.  B  [he  east 
j;ate  or  gate  of  Shvsham.  CC  The  shops  where  wine,  oil,  salt,  meal,  and 
other  things  used  in  the  sacrifices,  were  sold  ;  w  ith  chambers  over  on  either 
side.  D  The  north  gate  called  Tedi.  EE  The  porters'  lodges,  and  cham- 
])ers  over  on  either  side.  Between  this  gate  and  the  western  corner,  upon 
getting  out  of  the  mountain,  stood  the  castle  .-7/i.'o?n'a,  formerly  called  Barin. 
where  the  Romaim  kept  a  garrison  to  overawe  the  temple  ;  from  iience  the 
captain  of  it  was  called  the  captain  of  the  temple,  Luke  xxii.  52  :  Acts  iv. 
1.  It  was  a  square  pile  two  furlongs  in  compass,  standing  at  a  little  distance 
from  the  temple  wall,  and  from  which  there  was  a  passage  by  stairs  down 
into  the  cloisters  at  the  northwest  corner,  through  which  the  soldiers  ran 
down  to  appease  the  tumult  risen  about  Paul,  Acts  xxi.  32,  and  from  which 
Paul  spoke  to  the  people,  ver.  40.  FF  The  two  gates  in  the  south  side,  call- 
ed the  gales  of  Huldah.  G  The  porters'  lodges,  and  chambers  over  on 
either  side.  H  The  gate  Chalhrheih  or  Copnnius  on  the  west  side.  I  The 
gate  Fffrftor  on  the.  same  side.  K  The  porters'  lodges,  and  chambers  over 
on  either  side  of  the  said  two  gates.  L  The  two  gates  of  Mujipim  on  the 
same  west  side.  M  The  rooms  and  chambers  over  on  either  side  of  the 
said  two  gates,  where  a  treasury  of  the  temple  was  kept :  the  pile  of  each 
gate  was  tifteen  cubits  broad  and  thirty  high,  and  the  entrance  ten  cubits 
broad  and  twenty  cubits  high.  And  ail  the  gates,  as  well  in  the  inner  parts 
of  the  temple  as  the  outer,  were  everyone  of  them  of  liie  same  size.  IV 
The  portico  or  cloisters  round  the  temple,  that  on  the  soutli  side  was  called 
the  royal  cloisters,  because  of  its  largeness,  for  it  contained  three  aisles,  the 
middle  forty-two  cubits  and  an  half  broad,  and  fifty  cubits  high  ;  the  other 
two,  each  fifteen  cubits  broad,  and  twenty-five  cut)its  high,  w  liicli  was  tin; 
size  of  all  the  other  cloisters  of  this  court:  that  on  the  east  side  was  called 
.Solomon's  porch,  because  it  stood  upon  that  vast  terrace  which  Solomon  built, 
up  from  the  valley  beneath,  of  four  hundred  r'ubits  height,  which  was  the 
only  work  of  Solomoii's  temple  that  ren^ained  in  our  Saviours  time,  and 
therefore  it  was  called  Solonwa's  porch  ov  cloister,  John  s.  23  ;  .Acts  iif.  1  {. 

f  Ex'od.  i>.  2f»  S  Ezra  ili.  r. 


ilOOK  III.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  23  7 

in  preparinc;  materials,  and  contracting  with  carpenters  and 
masons  for  the  work,''  in  the  second  month  of  the  second 
year  they  laid  the  foundation  of  the  house  ;  which  was  done 
with   great   soiemnity  :    for   Zcrubbabcl  the  governor,  and 

O  The  outer  court  of  the  temple,  called  the  court  of  the  Gentiles.  P  The 
outer  enclosure  of  the  inner  courts,  being  a  wall  curiously  wrought  of  three 
cubits  height,  within  which  no  Gentile  was  to  enter,  or  any  puiluteii  with 
(lie  dead.  Q  The  wall  enciusing  the  inner  court  of  the  temple.  R  The 
space  between  the  said  wall  and  the  outer  enclosure  ten  cubits  broad, called 
the  Cliel.  S  The  stairs  on  the  east  end  leading  from  the  court  of  the  Gen- 
tiles \nlo  the  Chel,  cnnshting  oi  {(jarteeu  steps,  each  nine  inches  high.  T 
The  stairs  from  the  Chel  into  the  court  of  the  vvomcii,  consisting  of  five  steps, 
each  nine  inches  high.  V  The  gate  entering  into  the  court  of  the  women 
on  the  east,  called  the  beautiful  gate  of  the  temple,  Acts  iii.  2,  because  of 
its  sumptuonsuess  and  beautiful  adorniuents.  W  Other  two  gates  entering 
into  the  court  of  the  women,  one  on  tiie  south,  and  the  other  on  the  north. 
X  The  court  of  the  women  ;  so  called,  because  thus  far  the  women  might 
enter  to  worship,  but  not  further  ;  it  was  one  hundred  and  thirty-five  cubits 
square.  Y  Cloisters  on  three  sides  of  the  court  of  the  women,  over  which 
were  galleries  for  the  women.  ZZ  Two  rooms  under  the  floor  of  the  court 
of  Israel,  where  the  musicians  did  lay  up  their  instruments. 

1,2,  3,  4.  Four  smaller  courts  in  the  four  corners  of  the  court  of  the 
women,  each  forty  cubits  long,  and  thirty  broad.  1  Where  the  jXazariles 
performed  what  the  law  required.  2  Where  the  wood  for  the  altar  was 
wormed  by  the  blemished  priests  before  it  was  used.  3  Where  the  leper 
was  cleansed.  4  Where  the  wine  and  oil  were  laid  up  for  the  use  of  the  al- 
tar in  cellars  built  round  it  on  the  i.iside.  5  The  treasury  chests,  where 
our  Saviour  saw  the  widow  cast  in  her  two  mites,  he  then  sitting  on  the 
bench  in  the  cloisters.  For  all  the  cloisters  of  ;he  temple  had  benches  next 
the  inner  wall  for  the  people  to  sell  in  this  court  as  well  as  in  the  outer. 
And  of  some  place  nigh  these  chests  is  it  to  be  understood  where  our  Sa- 
■\'iour  is  said  to  preach  in  the  treasury,  John  viii.  20.  6  Tiie  semicircular 
stairs  leading  uj)  from  the  court  of  the  women  to  tiie  great  brazen  gate,  con- 
sisting of  fifteen  steps.  7  The  great  brazen  gate,  or  the  gate  Kicanor,  leading 
into  the  inner  court,  in  which  the  temple  and  altar  stood,  which  court  re- 
presented tlie  tabernacle,  and  contained  that  part  which  was  properly  called 
the  sanctuary  ;  it  was  one  hundred  and  thirty-five  cubits  in  breadth,  and  one 
hundred  and  eighty-seven  in  length.  8  The  wall  parting  the  sanctuary  from 
the  court  of  the  women.  9  I'he  place  within  the  sanctuary,  properly  call- 
ed the  court  of  Israel ;  for  here  stood  the  stationary  men  who  represented 
the  whole  people  of  Israel  at  all  times  of  public  worship,  and  hither  came 
up  all  other  Israelites  when  they  had  any  sacrifice  to  be  offered  (the  ordina- 
ry place  where  all  the  rest  worshipped  was  in  tiie  coiii't  of  the  women,  the 
men  on  the  floor  and  the  women  in  the  galleries.)  [t  contained  the  first 
aisle  of  the  double  cloisters  on  the  east  end,  and  both  the  single  cloisters  on 
the  north  and  south  sides.  10  The  place  properly  called  the  court  of  the 
priests;  it  contained  the  second  aisle  of  the  double  cloisters  at  the  east  end  of 
the  sanctuary :  tiie  first  two  cubits  of  its  breadth  next  the  court  of  /irae/ 
were  taken  up  by  the  desks  of  tlie  singers  and  musicians,  the  other  part  was 
the  place  where  the  priests  did  worship  that  were  out  of  attendance.  11 
The  king's  seat  near  the  pillar,  2  Cliron.  vi.  13  ;  xxviii.  13.  12  Winding 
stairs  leading  up  to  the  rooms  over  the  gale  .Viennor,  that  on  the  right-hand 
to  the  wardrobe,  where  the  vestments  for  the  priests  were  kept,  and  that 
on  the  left  to  the  room  where  were  provided  the  cake  for  the  high  priest '.s 
daily  meat-offering.  13  The  room  Gazelii,  where  the  Sanhedrim  sat,  part 
was  within  the  sanctuary  and  part  without ;  the  Sanhedrim  sat  in  that  part 
which  was  without.  14  The  well-room,  where  was  a  well  from  whence 
water  was  drawn  for  the  use  of  the  temple.  1-5  Three  gates  leading  into 
tbf> sanctuary  on  the  south  side,  the  first  next  the  draw-well  room  '.vas  from 
h  Ezra  iii.  P— 10.  &c 


238  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [I'ART  I. 

Jeshua  the  high-pricst,  being  present,  with  all  the  congrega 
lion,  the    trumpeters  blew   their   trumpets,  and    musicians 
sounded  Iheir  instruments,  and  singers  sung,  all  in  praise  to 
the  Lord  their  God,  and  all  the  rest  of  the  people  shouted 

thence  called  the  well-gale,  over  which  wns  the  room  of  Jslincs  where  the 
incense  was  made,  the  second  was  the  gale  of  Firstlings,  and  third  the  gate 
of  Ki7idling.  16  The  wood-room;  where  the  wood  for  the  altar,  after  it 
Iiad  been  wormed,  was  laid  ready  for  use  ;  over  it  was  the  chamber  of  the 
high-pricst  called  Paradrin,  where  he  held  the  council  of  the  temple.  17 
A  guard  room  for  tiie  Ltriles.  18  A  treasury-room.  19  The  common 
fire-room  and  chief  i;uard-room  for  the  Levilcs.  20  The  common  fire-room 
and  chief  guard-room  for  the  priests.  21  A  stone  in  the  middle  of  the  said 
room,  under  which  the  keys  of  the  temj>le  were  laid  every  night.  22  The 
room  where  the  lambs  for  the  daily  sacrifice  ^vere  kept  23  The  bath- 
room, where  the  priests  bathed  on  their  contracting  unclcanness.  24  The 
room  where  Ihe  show-bread  was  made.  25  The  room  where  the  stones  of 
the  altar  polluted  by  Jlnliochus  were  laid  u[)  by  the  Maccabees.  26  Three 
gates  on  the  north  side  leading  into  the  sanctuary  ;  the  first  towards  the  east 
end  called  the  gate  JYitzotz,  or  of  singing;  the  second  the  gale  of  women, 
and  the  gale  Corban.  27  The  room  where  the  salt  was  kept  for  the  ser- 
vice of  the  altar.  28  The  room  where  the  skins  of  the  sacrifices  were  laid 
lip.  29  The  room  where  the  inwards  of  the  sacrifices  were  washed.  30 
Another  guard-room  for  the  Lcvites,  over  which  was  a  guard-chamber  for 
the  priests.  31  The  room  where  the  priest  was  set  apart  seven  days,  that 
was  to  burn  the  red  cow.  32  Ringles,  where  the  sacrifices  were  tied  down 
to  be  slain.  33  Eight  posts  on  which  tiie  sacrifices  were  hung  up  to  be 
flayed.  34  Marble  tables  where  the  sacrifices  were  cut  ont  in  pieces.  35 
The  altar  of  burnt-offerings  twenty-four  cubits  square  at  the  top,  and  thirty- 
two  at  Ihe  bottom.  36  i  he  ascent  to  the  altar,  being  thirty  two  cubits  long. 
37  The  marble  tables  where  the  pieces  of  the  sacrifices  were  laid  that  were 
ready  for  the  altar.  38  The  brazen  sea.  39  The  stairs  up  into  the  porch, 
being  twelve  in  number.  40  The  entrance  into  the  porch,  twenty  cubits 
broad  and  forty  high. 

a  The  two  pillars,  Jachin  and  Boas,  standing  in  the  entrance,  b  Tiie 
porch,  eleven  cubits  broad,  and  sixty  long,  cc  The  room  where  the  butch- 
ering instruments  used  about  the  sacrifices  were  laid  up.  d  The  outer  wall 
of  the  porch,  e  The  inner  wall  of  the  porch.  /  The  gate  from  the  porch 
into  the  holy  place,  g- The  wicket  through  which  the  priest  went  to  unbar 
the  gate  on  the  inside,  for  the  opening  of  it  in  the  morning,  and  come  out 
after  having  barred  it  in  the  evening,  k  The  holy  place,  twenty  cubits 
broad  and  forty  long,  in  which  were  i  The  candlestick  having  seven  lamps  ; 
Ic  The  show-bread  table  ;  /  The  altar  of  incense,  m  The  holy  of  holies 
twenty  cubits  square,  in  which  were  /(  The  ark  of  the  covenant,  o  The 
two  Cherubims  ten  cubits  high,  with  their  faces  inwards  and  their  wings 
extended  to  each  other  over  the  ark  and  to  the  walls  on  either  side,  p  The 
vail  of  the  temple  parting  between  the  holy  and  the  holy  of  holies,  which 
was  rent  in  pieces  at  our  Saviour's  death,  q  The  treasury  rooms  on  the 
sides  and  west  end  of  the  temple,  three  stories  high,  in  which  the  tithes 
were  laid  up.  r  The  passages  into  the  said  rooms.  .i  The  galleries  run- 
ning before  them,  t  The  winding  staircases  leading  into  the  u[)per  .story. 
?(  Winding  stairs  leading  up  into  the  rooms  over' ihe  porch  and  temple. 
iviv  The  UTipvyioY  or  wings  of  the  temple  slretoliing  out  on  either  side.  The 
length  of  the  temple  from  out  to  out  was  one  hundred  cubits.  The  breadth 
of  the  temple  at  the  TlTefuyiov  from  out  to  out  one  hundred  cubit.s,  the  breadth 
of  the  temple  beyond  the  TlTicuym  from  out  to  out  seventy  cubits,  the  height 
i.f  the  temple  one  hundred  cubits.  The  height  of  the  UTip-jyicv  one  hundred 
and  twenty  cubits,  at  the  top  of  which  it  was  that  the  devil  did  set  our  Sa- 
viour.    Rlatt.  iv.  5. 


Delinealcd  and  describtd  according  to  lite  Scriptures,  Jostphns,andihe  Tah 
mud,  by  H.  PniriK.*ux,  D  D.  dean  ofJVortvirh 


BOOK  III. J      THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENT^.  :23b' 

for  joy,  while  tho  first  stones  were  laid  ;  only  the  old  men. 
who  had  seen  the  glory  of  the  first  temple,  and  had  no  ex- 
pectation that  this,  which  was  now  a  building  by  a  few  poor 
exiles  lately  returned  into  their  country,  could  ever  equal 
that  which  had  all  the  riches  of  David  and  Solomon,  two  of 
the  wealthiest  princes  of  the  east,  expended  in  the  erecting 
of  it,  wept  at  the  remembrance  of  the  old  temple,  v/hile 
others  rejoiced  at  the  laying  the  foundations  of  the  new. 
And  indeed  the  ditFereuce  between  the  former  temple  and 
this,  which  was  now  building,  was  so  great,  that  God  himself 
tells  the  prophet  Ilaggai,'  that  the  latter,  in  comparison  with 
the  former,  was  as  nothing  ;  so  much  did  it  come  short  of  it. 
But  this  is  not  to  be  understood  of  its  bigness  :  for  the 
second  temple  was  of  the  same  dimensions  with  tlie  first ;  it 
being  built  upon  the  very  same  foundations,  and  therefore  it 
was  exactly  of  the  same  length  and  breadth.  Cyrus's  com- 
mission may  seem  to  make  it  brooder;  for  that  allows  sixty 
cubits  to  its  breadth;*^  whereas  Solomon's  temple  is  said  to 
have  been  but  twenty  cubits  in  breadth.'  But  these  different 
measures  are  to  be  understood  in  respect  of  the  different 
distances  between  which  the  said  measures  were  taken. 
The  twenty  cubits  breadth,  said  of  Solomon's  temple,  was 
only  the  breadth  of  the  temple  itself,  measuring  from  the  in- 
side of  the  wall  on  the  one  side,  to  the  inside  of  the  wall  on 
the  other  side.  But  the  sixty  cubits  breadth  in  Cyrus's 
commission  was  the  breadth  of  the  whole  building,  measuring 
from  the  inside  of  the  outer  wall  of  it  on  the  one  side,  to  the 
inside  of  the  outer  wall  on  the  other  side.  For  besides  the 
temple  itself,  which  contained  the  holy  place,  and  the  holy 
of  holies,  each  twenty  cubits  broad,  there  were  thick  walls 
enclosing  it  on  each  side,  and  without  them  chambers  on 
each  side  ;  then  another  wall,  then  a  gallery,  and  then  the 
outer  walls  of  all  enclosing  the  whole  building,  being  five 
cubits  thick  ;  which  altogether  made  up  the  whole  breadth 
to  be  seventy  cubits  from  out  to  out ;  from  which  deducting 
the  five  cubits  breadth  of  the  outer  wall  on  each  side,  yoti 
have  remaining  the  breadth  of  Cyrus's  commission,  that  is, 
sixty  cubits  ;  which  was  the  breadth  of  the  whole  building 
from  the  inside  of  one  outer  wall  to  the  inside  of  the  other." 
So  that  the  difference  of  the  said  twenty  cubits  breadth,  and 
of  the  said  sixty  cubits  breadth,  is  no  more  than  this,  that 
one  of  them  was  measured  from  the  inside  to  the  inside  of 
the  inner  walls;^  and  the  other  from  the  inside  to  the  inside 
of  the  outer  walls  of  the  said  temple. 

But  the  glory  of  Solomon's  temple  was  not  in  the  temple 

i  Haggaiii.  3.  1  1  Kings  vi.  2.     2  Chron.  iii.3. 

k  'Ezra.  vi.  .^  m  See  Lightfoot  of  the  temple. 


<240  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OF  [pART  I* 

itself,  much  less  in  the  bigness  of  it ;  for  that  alone  was  but 
a  small  pile  of  building,  as  containing  no  more  than  one 
hundred  and  iifty  feet  in  length,  and  one  hundred  and  five  in 
breadth,  taking  the  whole  of  it  together  from  out  to  out ; 
which  is  exceeded  by  many  of  our  parish  churches.  The 
main  grandeur  and  excellency  of  it  consisted,  1st,  In  its 
ornaments,  its  workmanship  being  every  where  exceedingly 
curious,  and  its  overlayings  vast  and  prodigious  :  for  the 
overlaying  of  the  holy  of  holies  only,  which  was  a  room  but 
thirty  feet  square,  and  thirty  feet  high,  amounted  to  six 
hundred  talents  of  gold,'  v/hich  comes  to  four  millions  three 
hundred  and  twenty  thousand  pounds  of  our  sterling  money* 
2d]y,  In  its  materials  ;  for  Solomon's  temple  was  all  built  of 
new  large  stones,  hewn  out  in  the  most  curious  and  artful 
manner;  whereas  the  second  temple  was  mostly  built  of 
such  stones  only  as  they  dug  up  out  of  the  ruins  of  the  former* 
odiy,  In  its  outbuildings  ;  for  the  court  in  which  the  temple 
stood,  and  that  without  it  called  the  coxu-t  of  the  women^ 
were  built  round  with  stately  building.-  and  cloisters;  and  the 
gates  entering  thereinto  were  very  beautiful  and  sumptuous  ; 
and  the  outer  court,  which  was  a  large  square  encompassing 
all  the  rest,  of  seven  hundred  and  tifty  feet  on  every  side, 
was  surrounded  with  a  most  stately  and  magnificent  cloister, 
sustained  by  tlirce  rows  of  pillars  on  three  sides  of  it,  and 
by  four  on  the  fourth.  :  and  all  the  out-buildings  then  lay  in 
their  rubbish,  witl^ut  any  i)rospect  of  a  speedy  reparation; 
and  there  could  thcMi  be  no  such  ornaments  or  materials  iu 
this  new  temple,  as  there  were  in  the  former.  In  process 
of  time,  indeed,  all  the  out-buildings  were  restored,  and  such 
ornaments  and  materials  were  added,  on  Herod's  repairing 
of  it,  that  the  second  temple  after  that,  came  little  short 
herein  of  the  former;  and  there  are  some  who  will  say,  that 
it  exceeded  it.f  But  still  what  was  the  main  glory  of  the  first 
temple,  those  extraordinary  marks  of  the  divine  favour,  with 
which  it  was  honoured,  were  wholly  wanting  in  the  second. 
The  Jews  reckon  ihem  up  in  these  five  particulars  ;i  1. 
The  ark  of  the  covenant,  and  the  mercy-seat  which  was  upon 
it  ;  2.  The  Shechinah,  or  divine  presence  ;  3.  The  Urim 
and  Thummim ;  4.  The  holy  fire  upon  the  altar  ;  and,  5. 
The  spirit  of  prophecy. 

I.  The  ark  of  the  covenant  was  a  small  chest,''  or  coffer, 
three  feet  nine  inches  in  length,  and  two  feet  three  inches 
in  breadth,  and  two  feet  three  inches  in  height;  in  which 
were  put  the  two  tables  of  the  law,  as  well  as  the  broken 

o  2  Cliron.  iii.  8.  p  R.  Azaiias  in  Meor  Enaiim,  part  3,  c.  51. 

q  Talmud  Bab.  in  Yoma,  c.  1,  f.  21,  and  Talmud  Hierosol.  in  Taanith.  t 
•3,  f.  6,5.  r  Exod.  xxv,  lO— 22. 


TiiK  Icn.'ocHAi'in-  ok  tiiu  Tkmpi.k  ok-  .lKni-sAi,KsiinTHADK8CBn«Tios-oi»  tub  Same. 


p»M^tti.i.::ij'..,.%,f,i,.Bjl«fc.VilMiii:J ..  |iiiM!f«>:i|i.iiiiij'|ij.ima|>.»lii|  .  msmEa^mSKSBM 


*  -BK. 


p 


BOOK  lll.j  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  241 

ones  (say  the  Rabbins)'  as  tlie  whole  ;  and  that  there  was 
nothing  else  in  it,  when  it  was  brought  into  Solomon's  temple, 
is  said  in  two  places  of  Scripture.*^  But  the  Rabbins  raise 
a  controversy  concerning  Aaron's  rod,  and  the  pot  of  manna, 
and  the  original  volume  of  the  law  written  by  Moses's  own 
hand,  whether  they  were  not  also  in  the  ark.  It  is  said  of 
Aaron's  rod,"  and  the  pot  of  manna,^  that  they  were  laid  up 
before  the  testimony ;  and  it  being  agreed  on  all  hands,  that 
by  the  testimony  are  meant  the  two  tables,  those  who  inter- 
pret these  words  [before  the  testimony]  in  the  strictest  sense, 
will  have  the  said  rod  and  pot  of  manna  to  have  been  laid 
up  immediately  before  the  tables  within  the  ark ;  for  other- 
wise (say  they)  they  would  not  have  been  laid  up  before  the 
testimony,  but  before  the  ark.  But  others  who  do  not  un- 
derstand the  word  in  so  strict  a  sense,  say,  they  were  laid  up 
in  the  holy  of  holies  without  the  ark  in  a  place  just  before  it ; 
thinking  that  in  this  position,  without  the  ark,  they  may  be  as 
well  said  to  be  laid  up  before  the  testimony  or  tables  of  the 
law,  as  if  they  had  been  placed  immediately  before  them 
within  the  ark. 

But  the  holy  apostle  St.  Paul  decides  this  controversy ;  for 
he  positively  tells  us,  Thatxoithin  the  arkroere  the  golden  pot, 
that  had  vianna,  and  Aaron'' s  rod,  and  the  tables  of  the  covenant  J 
As  to  the  book,  or  volume  of  the  law,  it  being  commanded 
to  be  put  mitzzad,  i.  e.  on  the  side  of  the  ark,^  those  who  in- 
terpret that  word  of  the  inside,  place  it  within  the  ark,  and 
those  who  interpret  it  of  the  outside,  place  it  on  the  outside 
of  it,  in  a  case  or  coflfer  made  of  purpose  for  it,  and  laid  on 
the  right  side,  meaning,  by  the  right  side,  that  end  of  it  which 
was  on  the  right-hand.  And  the  last  seem  to  be  in  the  right 
as  to  this  matter  ;  for,  1st,  The  same  word,^  mitzzad,  is  made 
use  of,  where  it  is  said,  that  the  Philistines  sent  back  the  ark 
with  an  offering  of  jewels  of  gold  put  in  a  cotier  by  the  side 
of  it.  And  there  it  is  certain  that  word  must  be  understood 
of  the  outside,  and  not  of  tiie  inside.  2dly,  The  ark  was 
not  of  capacity  enough  to  hold  the  volume  of  the  whole  law 
of  Moses  with  the   other  things  placed  therein.     Sdly,  the 

s  For  the  proof  of  this,  they  bring;  the  2d  verse  of  tha  10th  chapter  of  Deu- 
teronomy, which  they  read  thus :  Arid  I  tvill  write  on  the  tables  the  words 
that  were  on  the  first  table,  which  thou  brakest,  and  hast  put  in  the  ark.  And 
it  is  true,  the  word  is  veshamata,  i.  e.  and  thou  hastput,in  the  preter  tense  ; 
but  it  being  with  a  vau  before  it,  that  turns  the  preter  tense  into  the  future, 
and  therefore  it  must  be  read,  and  thou  shalt  put  them,  as  in  our  translation, 
and  not  arid  thou  hast  put  them,  as  the  fautors  of  this  opinion  would  have  it. 

t  1  Kings  viii.  9.    2  Chron.  v.  10.  u  Num.  xvii.  10. 

X  Exod.  xvi.  33,  where  to  lay  up  before  the  Lord,  is,  by  the  Jewish  com' 
mentators,  interpreted  as  the  same  with  before  the  testimony  of  the  Lord. 

y  Heb.  ix.  4,  and  hereto  agree  Abarbanel  on  1  Kings  viii.  9,  and  R.  Levi 
Ben  Gersom. 

2  Deut.  xxxi.  26  a  ]  Sam.  vi.  8- 

Vol.1.  31 


242  CONNEXION    OF  THE    HISTORY  OP  [PART  li 

6nd  of  laying  up  the  original  volume  of  the  law  in  the  temple 
was,  that  it  might  be  reserved  there,  as  the  authentic  copy, 
by  which  all  others  were  to  be  corrected,  and  set  right;  and 
therefore,  to  answer  this  end,  it  must  have  been  placed  so, 
as  that  access  might  be  had  thereto  on  all  occasions  requiring 
it ;  which  could  not  have  been  done,  if  it  had  been  put  within 
the  ark,  and  shut   up  there  by  the   cover  of  the  mercy-seat 
over  it,  which  was  not  to  be  removed.     And,  4thly,  When 
Hilkiah  the  high-priest,  in  the  time  of  Josiah,  found  the  copy 
of  the  law  in  the  temple,*^  there  is   nothing  said  of  the  ark; 
neither  is  it  there  spoken  of  as  taken  from  thence,   but  as 
found  elsewhere  in  the  temple.     And  therefore,  putting  all 
this  together,  it  seems  plain,   that  the  volume  of  the  law  was 
not  laid  within  the  ark,  but  had  a  particular  coffer,  or  repo- 
sitory of  its  own,   in  which  it  was  placed  on  the  side  of  it. 
And  the  word  mit:zad,  which  answers  to  the  Latin  a  latere, 
cannot    truly  bear  any  other  meaning  in  the   Hebrew  lan- 
guage.    And  therefore  the  Chaldee  paraphrase,  which  goes 
under  the  name  of  Jonathan  Ben  Uzziel,  in  paraphrasing  on 
these  words  of  Deuteronomy,*^   Take  this  book  of  the  lazv,  and 
put  it  in  the  side  of  the  ark  of  the   covenant,  renders  it  thus, 
Take  the  book  of  the  law,  and  place  it  in  a  case,  or  coffer,  on  the 
right  side  of  the  ark  of  the  covenant   of  the  Lord  your  God, 
Over  the  ark  was  the  mercy-seat,  and  it  was  the  covering  of 
it.""     It  was  all  made  of  solid  gold,  and  of  the  thickness  (say 
the  Rabbins)  of  an  hand's    breadth.     At  the  two  ends  of  it 
were  two  cherubims,  looking  inward  towards  each  other,  with 
wings  expanded,  which  embracing  the  whole  circumference 
of  the  mercy-seat,  did  meet  on  each  side  in  the  middle ;  all 
which  (say  the   Rabbins)*^  was  made  out  of  the  same  mass, 
without  joining  any  of  the  parts  by   solder.^     Here  it  was 
where  the  Shechinah,  or  divine  presence,  rested  both  in  the 
tabernacle  and  temple,  and  was  visibly  seen  in  the  appear- 
ance of  a  cloud  over  it ;  and  from  hence  the  divine   oracles 
were  given  out  by  an  audible  voice,  as  often  as  God  was 
consulted  in  the  behalf  of  his  people.^     And  hence  it  is,  that 
God  is  so  often  said  in  Scripture  to  dwell  between  the  che- 
rubims,'' that  is,  between  the  cherubims  on  the  mercy-seat, 
because  there  was  the  seat  or  throne  of  the  visible  appear- 
ance of  his  glory  among  them.     And  for  this  reason  the  high- 
priest  appeared  before  this  mercy-scat  once  every  year,  on 
the  great  day  of  expiation,  when  he  was  to  make  his  nearest 

b  2  Kings  xxii.  8.  q  Deut.  xxxi.  26.  d  Exod.  xxv.  17—22. 

e  R.  lievi  Ben  Gersoni,  R.  Solomon,  Abarbanel,  and  others. 
f  Lev.  xvi.  2.  g  Exod.  xxv.  22.     Numb.vii.  89. 

h  1  Sam.  iv.  4.    2  Sara.  vi.  2.    2  Kingi=  xix.  15.     1  Chron.  xiii.  6,     Psalm 
■Ixxx.  1;  St.  1. 


BOOK  ill.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  243 

approach  to  the  divine  presence,  to  mediate,  and  make  atone- 
ment for  the  whole  people  of  Israel.'     And  all  else  of  that 
nation,  who  served  God  according  to  the  Levitical  law,  made 
it  the  centre  of  their  worship,  not  only  in  the  temple,  when 
they  came  up  thither  to  worship,  but  every  where  else  in 
their  dispersion  through  the   whole  world ;  whenever  they 
prayed,''  they  turned  their  faces  towards  the  place  where  the 
ark  stood,  and  directed  all  their  devotions  that  way.     And 
therefore  the  author  of  the  book  Cozri' justly  sarith,  that  the 
ark,  with  the  mercy-seat,  and  cherubim,  were  the  foundation, 
root,  heart,  and  marrow,  of  the  whole  temple,  and  all  the  Le- 
vitical worship  therein  performed.     And  therefore,  had  there 
nothing  else  of  the  first  temple  been  wanting  in  the  second 
but  the  ark  only,  this  alone  would  have  been  reason  enough 
for  the   old   men  to  have  wept,  when  they  remembered  the 
first  temple  in  which  it  was,  and  also  for  the  saying  of  Hag- 
gai,  that  the  second  temple  was  as  nothing  in  comparison  of 
the  first ;°"  so  great  a  part  had  it  in  the  glory  of  this  temple, 
as  long  as  it  remained  in  it.     However,  the  defect  was  sup- 
plied as  to  the  outward  form  :  for  in  the  second  temple  there 
was  also  an  ark  made  of  the  same  shape  and  dimensions  with 
the  first,  and  put  in  the  same  place."     But  though  it  was  there 
substituted  in  its  stead,  (as  there  was  need  that  such  an  one 
should  for  the  service  that  was  annually  performed  before  it 
on  the  great  day  of  expiation,)  yet  it  had  none  of  its  preroga- 
tives or  honours  conferred  upon  it ;  for  there  were  no  tables 
of  the  law,  no  Aaron's  rod,  no  pot  of  manna  in  it,  no  appear- 
ance of  the  divine  glory  over  it,  no  oracles  given  from  it. 
The  first  ark  was  made   and  consecrated  by  God's  appoint- 
ment, and  had  all  these  prerogatives  and  honours  given  unto 
it  by  him.     But  the  second,  being  appointed  and  substituted 
by  man  only,  to  be  in  the  stead  and  place  of  the  other,  could 
have  none  of  them.     And  the  only  use  that  was  made  of  it, 
was  to  be  a  representative  of  the  former  on  the  great  day  of 
expiation  ;  and  to  be  a  repository  of  the  holy  Scriptures,  that 
is,  of  the  original  copy  of  that  collection  which  was  made  of 
them  after  the  captivity,  by  Ezra  and  the  men  of  the  great 
synagogue,  as  will  be  hereafter  related  :  for  when   this  copy 
was  perfected,  it  was  there  laid  up  in  it.     And,  in  imitation 
hereof,  the  Jews,  in  all  their  synagogues,  have  a  like  ark  or 
coflfer,  of  the  same  size  or  form,  in  which  they  keep  the  Scrip- 
tures belonging  to  the    synagogue  ;  and   from  whence  they 
take  it  out  with  great  solemnity,  whenever  they  use  it,  and 

i  Lev.  xvi.  29—34.     Numb.  xxix.  1-     Heb.  ix.  7.    Talmud  in  Yoraa. 

k  1  Kings  viii.  48.     Dan.  v.  10.  1  Part  ii.  §  28. 

m  Chap.  ii.  y.  n  Lightfoot  of  the  Templ«,  c.  15,  §  4, 


344  CONNEXION  OK  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PARi   I. 

return  it  with  the  like,  when  they  have  done  witli  it."  That 
there  was  any  ark  at  all  in  the  second  temple,  many  of  the 
Jewish  writers  do  deny  ;  and  say,  that  the  whole  service  of 
the  great  day  of  expiation  was  performed  in  the  second  tem- 
ple, not  before  any  ark,  but  before  the  stone  on  which  the 
ark  stood  in  the  first  temple. p  But  since,  on  their  building  of 
the  second  temple,  they  found  it  necessary,  for  the  carrying 
on  of  their  worship  in  it,  to  make  a  new  altar  of  incense,  a  new 
show-bread  table,  and  a  new  candlestick,  instead  of  those 
which  the  Babylonians  had  destroyed,  though  none  of  them 
could  be  consecrated  as  in  the  first  temple,  there  is  no  reason 
to  believe,  but  that  they  made  a  new  ark  also  ;  there  being 
as  much  need  of  it,  for  the  carrying  on  of  their  worship,  as 
there  was  of  the  others.  And  since  the  holy  of  holies,  and 
the  vail  that  was  drawn  before  it,  were  wholly  for  the  sake 
of  the  ark,  what  need  had  there  been  of  these  in  the  second 
temple,  if  there  had  not  been  the  other  also  ?  Were  it  clear, 
that  it  is  the  figure  of  the  ark  that  is  on  the  triumphal  arch  of 
Titus,  still  remaining  at  Rom.e,  this  would  be  an  undeniable 
demonstration  for  what  I  here  say  :  for  therein  his  triumph 
for  the  taking  of  Jerusalem  being  set  forth  in  sculpture,  there 
is  to  be  seen,  even  to  this  day,  carried  before  him  in  that 
triumph,  the  golden  candlestick,  and  another  figure,  which 
Adrichomius  and  some  others  say  is  the  ark:  but  Villalpan- 
dus,  Cornelius  a  Lapide,  Ribara,  and  the  generality  of  learn- 
ed men,  who  have  viewed  that  triumphal  ark,  tell  us,  that  is 
the  table  of  show-bread.  The  obscurity  of  the  figures,  now 
almost  worn  out  by  length  of  time,  makes  the  difficulty  ;  but, 
by  the  exactest  draughts  that  I  have  seen  of  it,  it  plainly  ap- 
pears to  have  been  the  show-bread  table,  especially  from  the 
two  cups  on  the  top  of  it ;  for  two  such  cups  filled  with  frank- 
incense were  always  [)ut  upon  the  show-bread  table,  but 
never  upon  the  ark. 

Josephus,  who  was  present  at  the  triumph  of  Titus,  and  saw 
the  whole  of  it,'^  tells  us  of  three  things  therein  carried  be- 
fore him:  1st,  The  show-bread  table;  i'dly  the  golden  can- 
dlestick, (which  he  mentions  in  the  same  order  as  they  are 
on  the  arch  :)  and,  3dly,  The  law,  which  is  not  on  the  arch. 
Most  likely  it  was  omitted  there  only  for  want  of  room  to 
engrave  it :  for  as  there  is  the  figure  of  a  table  carried  aloft 
before  the  show-bread  table,  and  another  before  the  golden 
candlestick,  to  express,  by  the  writings  on  them,  what  the 
things  were,  which  they  were  carried  before  ;  so,  after  the 

o  Vide  Buxlorfii  Synagogam,  c.  14. 

p  This  the  Rabbins  call  the  ?(ono  of  foundation,  and  give  us  a  great  deal 
of  (rash  about  it.     See  the  Mishna  in  Voma,  and  Buster,  de  Area.  c.  22 
q  Josephus  de  Bello  .Tndaico.  II!).  7.  r.  17. 


BOOK  III.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENT^.  i4o 

golden  candlestick,  there  is  on  the  said  arch  a  third  table 
without  any  thing  after  it ;  the  arch  there  ending,  without 
affording  room  for  any  other  sculpture  ;  where  tlie  thing 
omitted,  no  doubt,  wa;?  what  Josephu>  saith  was  carried  in  the 
third  place,  that  is,  the  law  ;  which  is  not  to  be  understood 
of  any  common  volume  (of  which  there  were  hundreds  everj 
,  where  in  common  use,  both  in  their  synagogues  and  in  pri- 
vate hands,)  but  of  that  which  was  found  in  the  temple  (as 
the  other  two  particulars  were,)  and  laid  up  there,  as  the 
authentic  and  most  sacred  cop)  of  it.  Aud  it  cannot  be  ima- 
gined, it  should  be  carried  otiierwise,  than  in  that  repository 
in  which  it  was  laid,  that  is,  in  the  ark  which  was  made  for 
it  under  the  second  temple.  But,  to  return  to  the  ark  under 
the  tirst  temple,  which  was  that  I  was  describing:  it  was  made 
of  wood,""  excepting  only  the  mercy-seat,  but  overlaid  with 
gold  all  over,  both  in  the  inside  and  the  outside,  and  it  had  a 
ledge  of  gold  surrounding  it  on  the  top,  in  form  of  a  crown  ; 
into  which,  as  into  a  socket,  the  cover  was  let  in.  The  place 
where  it  stood  was  the  innermost  and  most  sacred  part  of 
the  temple,  called  The  holy  of  holies,  and  sometimes,  The 
most  holy  place,^  which  was  ordained  and  made  of  purpose 
for  its  reception  ;  the  whole  end  and  reason  of  that  most 
sacred  place  being  none  other,  but  to  be  a  tabernacle  for  it. 
This  place  or  room  was  of  an  exact  cubic  form,  as  being  thirty 
feet  square  and  thirty  feet  high.'  In  the  centre  of  it  the  ark 
was  placed  upon  a  stone  (say  the  Rabbins,)"  rising  there  three 
fingers  breadth  above  the  floor,  to  be,  as  it  were,  a  pedestal 
for  it.  On  the  two  sides  of  it  stood  two  cherubims  fifteen 
feet  high,^  one  on  the  one  side,  and  the  other  on  the  other 
side,  at  equal  distance  between  the  centre  of  the  ark  and  each 
side-wall;  where  having  their  wings  expanded,  with  two  of 
them  they  touched  the  said  side-walls,  and  with  the  other  two 
they  did  meet,  and  touch  each  other  exactly  over  the  middle 
of  the  ark  ;  so  that  the  ark  stood  exactly  in  the  middle 
between  these  two  cherubims.  But  it  is  not  in  respect  of 
these,  that  God  is  so  often  said  in  Scripture  to  dwell  between 
the  cherubims,  but  in  respect  of  the  cherubims  only,  which 
were  on  the  mercy-seat,  as  hath  been  observed  :  for  most  of 
those  places  of  Scripture,  wherein  this  phrase  is  found,  were 
written  before  Solomon's  temple  was  built  ;  and  till  then 
there  was  no  such  cherubims  in  the  most  holy  place  ;  for  they 
were  put  there  in  the  temple  only,  and  not  in  the  tabernacle. 
These  cherubims  stood  not  with  their  faces  outward,  as  they 
are  commonly  represented,  but  with  their  faces  inward  -^ 
and  therefore  were  in  the  posture  of  figures  worshipping,  and 

r  Exod.  XXV.  10—22.  s  1  Kings  viii.  16. 

t  1  Kings  vi.  20.  u  Yoma,  c.  v.  §  2. 

»  I  Kings  vi.  23.     2  Chron.  iii.  10.  y  2  Chron,  iii.  13. 


246  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OP  [PART  1. 

not  in  Ihe  posture  of  figures  to  be  worshipped,  as  some  fau- 
tors  of  idolatry  do  assert.  The  ark,  while  it  was  ambulatory 
with  the  tabernacle,  was  carried  by  staves  on  the  shoulders  of 
the  Levites.^  These  staves  were  overlaid  with  gold,  and  put 
through  golden  rings  made  for  them,  not  on  the  sides  of  the 
ark,  as  all  hitherto  have  asserted,  but  on  the  two  ends  of  it; 
which  plainly  appears  from  this,  that,  when  it  was  carried 
into  the  temple  of  Solomon,  and  fixed  there  in  the  most  holy 
place,  which  was  ordained  and  prepared  of  purpose  for  it, 
the  Scriptures  tell  us,"  that  the  staves  being  drawn  out,  reach- 
ed downwards  towards  the  holy  place,  which  was  without  the 
most  holy  place,  or  holy  of  holies  :  for  had  they  been  on  the 
sides  of  the  ark  lengthwise,  they  would,  on  their  being  drawn 
out,  have  reached  towards  the  side-wall,  and  not  downward, 
unless  you  suppose  the  ark  to  have  been  there  put  sideway, 
with  one  of  its  ends  downward,  and  the  olherupward  ;  which 
no  one  will  say.  And  it  is  a  plain  argument  against  it,  that 
the  high-priest,  when  he  appeared  before  the  ark  on  the  great 
day  of  expiation,  is  said  to  have  gone  up  to  it  between  the 
staves  ;^  but  if  these  staves  had  been  drawn  out  from  the 
sides,  there  would  then  have  been  but  two  feet  three  inches 
between  them,  which  would  not  have  afforded  the  high-priest 
room  enough,  with  all  his  vestments  on,  to  have  passed  up 
between  them  towards  the  ark,  for  the  performance  of  that 
duty.  Neither  could  the  bearers,  in  so  near  a  position  of  the 
staves  to  each  other,  go  with  any  convenience  in  the  carry- 
ing of  the  ark  from  place  to  place  on  their  shoulders,  but 
they  must  necessarily  have  incommoded  each  other,  both 
before  and  behind,  in  going  so  near  together.  What  became 
of  the  old  ark,  on  the  destruction  of  the  temple  by  Nebu- 
chadnezzar, is  a  dispute  among  the  Rabbins.*^  Had  it  been 
carried  to  Babylon  with  the  other  vessels  of  the  temple,  it 
would  again  have  been  brought  back  with  them  at  the  end 
of  the  captivity.  But  that  it  was  not  so,  is  agreed  on  all 
hands :  and  therefore  it  must  follow,  that  it  was  destroyed 
with  the  temple  ;  as  were  also  the  altar  of  incense,  the  show- 
bread  table,  and  the  golden  candlestick  :  for  all  these  in  the 
second  temple  were  made  anew  after  the  rebuilding  of  it. 
However,  the  Jews  contend,  that  it  was  hid  and  preserved  by 
Jeremiah,  say  some,  out  of  the  second  book  of  Maccabees.'^ 
But  most  of  them  will  have  it,  that  king  Josiah,  being  fore- 
told byHuldah  the  prophetessi,that  the  temple  would  speedily 
after  his  death  be  destroyed,  caused  the  ark  to  be  put  in  a 

7.  Exod.  XXV.  13, 14,  &LC.  h.  xxvii.  5.     ISumb.  iv.  4 — 6.    1  Cbron.  xv.  15. 
a  1  Kings  viii.  8.    2  Chron.  v.  9. 

b  Misbna  in  Yoma,  c.  V.     Maimonides  in  Avodhath.     Yom  Haccipurim 
c  Vide  Bustorfium  de  Area-  c.  21,  22.  d  2  Maccabees  ii. 


COOK  III.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  247 

vault  underground,  which  Solomon,  foreseeing  this  destruc- 
tion, had  caused  of  purpose  to  be  built,  for  the  preserving  of 
it.''  And,  for  the  proof  hereof,  they  produce  the  text,  where 
Josiah  commands  the  Levites*^  to  put  the  holy  ark  in  the 
house  "  which  Solomon  the  son  of  David,  king  of  Israel,  did 
build ;"  interpreting  it  of  his  putting  the  ark  into  thesaid  vault, 
where,  they  say,  it  hath  lain  hid  ever  since,  even  to  this  day, 
and  from  thence  shall  be  manifested,  and  brought  out  again 
in  the  days  of  the  Messiah;  whereas  the  words  import  no  more, 
than  that  Manasseh,  or  Amon,  having  removed  the  ark  from 
whence  it  ought  to  have  stood,  Josiah  commanded  it  again 
to  be  restored  into  its  proper  place.  Other  dotages  of 
the  Rabbins  concerning  this  ark  I  forbear  troubling  the  reader 
with. 

II,  The  second  thing  wanting  in  the  second  temple,  which 
was  in  the  first,  was  the  Shecliinah,  or  the  divine  presence, 
manifested  by  a  visible  cloud  resting  over  the  mercy-seat,  as 
hath  been  already  shown.  This  cloud  did  there  first  appear 
when  Moses  consecrated  the  tabernacle,  and  was  afterward, 
on  the  consecrating  of  the  temple  by  Solomon  translated 
thither.  And  there  it  did  continue  in  the  same  visible  man- 
ner, till  that  temple  was  destroyed  ;  but,  after  that,  it  never 
appeared  more.  Its  constant  place  was  directly  over  the  mer- 
cy-seat ;S  but  it  rested  there  only,  when  the  ark  was  in  its  pro- 
per place,  in  the  tabernacle  first,  and  afterward  in  the  temple, 
and  not  while  it  was  in  movement  from  place  to  place,  as  it 
often  was  during  the  time  of  the  tabernacle. 

III.  The  third  thing  wanting  in  the  second  temple,  which 
was  in  the  first,  was  the  Urim  and  Thummim.  Concerning 
this  many  have  written  very  much  ;  but,  by  offering  their 
various  opinions,  have  helped  rather  to  perplex  than  ex- 
plain the  matter.  The  points  to  be  inquired  into  concerning 
it,  are  these  two,  1st,  What  it  was?  and,  2dly,  What  was  the 
use  of  it  ? 

1st,  As  to  what  it  was,  the  Scripture  hath  nowhere  explain- 
ed it  any  farther,  than  to  say,  that  it  was  something  which 
Moses  did  put  into  the  breastplate  of  the  high-priest.'*  This 
breastplate'  was  a  piece  of  cloth  doubled,  of  a  span  square, 
in  which  were  set  in  sockets  of  gold  twelve  precious  stones, 
bearing  the  names  of  the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel  engraven 
on  them  ;  which  being  fixed  to  the  ephod,  or  upper  vestment 
of  the  high-priest's  robes,  was  worn  by  him  on  his  breast  on 
all  solemn  occasions.  In  this  breastplate  the  Utrnt  and  Thurri' 
mini,  say  the  Scriptures,'^  were  put.     They  who  hold  them  to 

e  Vide  Buxlorfium,  rbld.  f  2  Chron.  xxxv.  S. 

g  Lev.  xvi.  2.  h  Exod.  xxviii.  30.     Levit.  viii.  8. 

i  Exod.  xxviii,  15—30 :  xxix.  8—21.        k  Exod.  xxviii.  30,    Levit.  viii.  8, 


ii>4G  CONNEXION    OF  THE   HISTORY    OV  [PART  t. 

liave  been  some  corporeal  things  there  placed  beside  the 
stones,  will  have  them  to  be  enclosed  within  the  folding  or 
doubling  of  the  breastplate,  which,  the^^  say,  was  doubled 
for  this  very  purpose,  that  it  might  be  made  fit,  as  in  a  purse, 
to  contain  them  in  it.  Christophorus  a  Castro,*  and  from 
him  Dr.  Spencer,"  tells  us,  that  they  were  two  images,  which 
being  thus  shut  up  in  the  doubling  of  the  breastplate,  did 
from  thence  give  the  oracular  answer,  by  a  voice.  But  this 
is  a  conceit,  which  a  late  very  learned  man  haih  sufficiently 
shown  to  be  both  absurd  and  impious,  as  savouring  more  of 
heathenism  and  idolatry,  than  of  the  pure  institution  of  a 
divine  law."  Some  will  have  them  to  be  the  Tetragramma- 
ton,°  or  the  inelFable  name  of  God,  which  being  written  or 
engraven,  say  they,  in  a  mysterious  manner,  and  done  in  two 
parts  and  in  two  ditFerent  ways,  were  the  things  signified  by 
the  Urim  and  Thummim.  which  Moses  is  said  to  have  put 
into  the  breastplate ;  and  that  these  did  give  the  oracular 
power  to  it.  And  many  of  the  Rabbins  go  this  way  ;P  for 
they  have  all  of  them  a  great  opinion  of  the  miraculous  pow- 
er of  this  name  :  and,  therefore,  not  being  able  to  gainsay 
the  evidence  which  there  is  for  the  miracles  of  Jesus  Christy 
their  usual  answer  is,i  that  he  stole  this  name  out  of  the  tem- 
ple, from  the  stone  of  foundation  on  which  it  was  there  writ- 
ten, (that  is,  the  stone  on  which  the  ark  formerly  stood,)  and 
keeping  it  hid  always  about  him,  by  virtue  of  that  did  all  his 
wondrous  works.  Others,  who  hold  in  general  for  the  ad- 
dition of  some  things  corporeal,  denoted  by  the  means  of 
Urim  and  Thummim,^  think  not  fit  to  inquire,  what  they  were 
as  to  the  particular,  but  are  of  opinion,  that  they  were  things 
of  a  mysterious  nature,  hid  and  closed  up  in  the  doubling  of 
the  breastplate,  which  Moses  only  knew  of,  who  did  put  them 
there,  and  no  one  else  was  to  pry  into  ;  and  that  these  were 
the  things  that  gave  the  oracular  power  to  the  high-priest, 
when  he  had  the  breastplate  on.  But  this  looking  too 
much  like  a  telesme,  or  a  spell,  which  were  of  those  abomi- 
nations that  God  abhorred,  it  will  be  safest  to  hold,  that  the 
words  Urim  and  Thummim  meant  no  such  things,  but  only  the 
divine  virtue  and  power,  given  to  the  breastplate  in  its  con- 
secration, of  obtaining  an  oracular  answer  from  God,  when- 

1  De  Vaticinio.  ra  In  Dissertatione  de  Urim  et  Thuuimim 

n  Dr.  Pocock  in  his  comment  on  Hosea.  iii.  4. 

o  Para;'hrasis  Jotiatlianis  in  Exod.  xxviii.  30.  Liber  Zohar,  fol.  105,  edi- 
tionis  Gremonensis. 

p  R.  :^o'.oraon,R.  Moses  Ben  Nachman,  R.  Becai,  R.  Levi  Ben  Gersom, 
aliique. 

q  Teledoth  Jesu  ex  editione  Wagenselii,  p.  6,  7.  Raymundi  Pugio  Fidei, 
part  2.  c.  8.     Buxtorfii  Lexicon.  Rab.  p.  254L 

r  R.  David  Kimchi.  R,  Abraham  Seva,  Aben  Ezra,  aliique 


JIOOK  111. J  i  Hi:  OLD  A\D  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  249 

ever  counsel  was  asked  of  him  by  the  high-priest  with  it  on. 
in  such  manner  as  his  word  did  direct;  and  that  the  names 
of  Urim  and  Thummim  were  given  hereto  only  to  denote  the 
clearness  and  perfection  which  these  oracular  answers  always 
carried  with  them  ;  for  Urim  signifieth  light,  and  Thummim^ 
perftction :  for  these  answers  were  not,  like  the  heathen 
oracles,  enigmatical  and  ambiguous ;  but  always  clear  and 
manifest ;  not  such  as  did  ever  fall  short  of  perfection,  cither 
of  fulness  in  the  answer,  or  certainty  in  the  truth  of  it.  And 
hence  it  is,  that  the  Septuagint  translate  Urim  and  Thummim 
by  the  words  AjjAwc-jv  ««<  am^sixv,  i.  e.  manifestation  and  truth, 
because  all  these  oracular  answers  given  by  Urim  and  Thum- 
mim, were  always  clear  and  manifest,  and  their  truth  ever 
certain  and  infallible. 

2.  As  to  the  use  v/hich  is  made  of  the  Urim  and  Thummim^, 
it  was  to  ask  counsel  of  God  in  difficult  and  momentous  cases 
relating  to  the  whole  state  of  Israel.     In  order  whereto  the 
high-priest  did  put  on  his   robes,  and  over  them  his  breast- 
plate, in  which  the  Urim  and  Thummim  were,  and  then  pre- 
sented himself  before  God  to  ask  counsel  of  him.  But  he  was 
not  to  do  this  for  any  private  man,°  but  only  for  the  king,  for 
the  president  of  the  Sanhedrim,  for  the  general  of  the  army, 
or  for  some  other  great  prince  or  public  governor  in  Israel, 
and  not  for  any  private  atfairs,'^  but  for  such  only  ^s  related 
to  the  public  interest  of  the  nation,  either  in  church  or  state  : 
for  he  appeared  before  God,  with  the  names  of  the  twelve 
tribes  of  Israel  upon  his  breastplate  ;  and  therefore  whatever 
counsel  he  asked  was  in  the  name,  and  on  the  behalf  of  all 
the  tribes,  and  consequently  it  must  have  been  concerning 
matters  which  related   publicly  to  them   all.      The  place 
where  he  presented  himself  before  God  was  before  the  ark 
of   the   covenant,"  not  within  the  vail  of  the  holy  of  holies, 
(for  thither  he  never  entered  but  once  a  year,  on  the  great 
day  of   expiation,)   but  without  the  vail  in  the  holy  place : 
and  there  standing  with  his  robes  and  breastplate  on,  and  his 
face  turned  directly  towards  the  ark  and  the  mercy-seat  over 
it,  on  which  the  divine  presence  rested,  he  proposed  the 
matter  concerning   which  counsel  of   God  was  asked,  and 
directly  behind  him  at  some  distance  without  the  holy  place, 
perchance  at  the  door,   (for  farther  no  layman  could  ap- 
proach,) stood  the  person  in  whose  behalf  the  counsel  was 
asked,  whether  it  were  the  king,  or  any  other  public  officer 
of  the  nation,  there,  with  all  humility  and  devotion  expect- 

s  Mishnah  in  Yoma,  c.  7,  sec.  5.  The  Talmudists  prove  this  from  Numb 
sxvii.  21.     See  Maimonidesin  Cele  Hammikdash,  c.  10,  v.  12. 

t  Abarbanel  in  Exod.  xxviii;  and  in  Deut.  xxxiii.  R.  L^vi  Ben  CJcrsom 
Maimonid.  ibid,  aliique. 

u  Maimonides,  ibid,    Yalcut.  fol.  248,  col.  J 


250  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PABT  I- 

ing  the  answer  that  should  be  given.     But  how  this  answer 
was  given  is  that  which  is  made  the  great  dispute.     The 
most  common  received  opinion  among  the  Jews  is,^  that  it 
was  by  the  shining  and  protuberating  of  the  letters  in  the 
names  of  the  twelve  tribes  graven  on  the  twelve  stones  in 
the  breastplate  of  the  high-priest,  and  that  in  them  he  did 
read  the  answer.      They  explain  it  by  the  example  which 
we    have    in    the    first   chapter  of  the    book   of   Judges.^' 
There  the  children  of  Israel,  either  by  the  president  of  the 
Sanhedrim,   or  some  other  officer  intrusted  with  the  public 
interest,  did  ask  counsel  of  God  ;     "Who  should  go  up  for 
us  against  the  Canaanites  first  to  fight  against  them  ?"^     The 
answer  given  by  the  high-priest,  who  did  by  Urim  and  Thum- 
mim  then  ask  counsel  of  God  for  them,  was    "  Judah  shall 
go  up  :"^  for  having  asked  the  counsel,  he  did  immediately 
(sa)'  they)  look  into  the  breastplate,  and  saw  there  those 
letters  shining  above  the  rest,  and  protuberating  beyond 
them  ;  which  being  combined  into  words  made  up  the  answer 
■which  was  given.     And  this  notion  was  very  ancient  among 
them  5    for  both  Josephus^  and  Philo  Judaeus*^  have  it ;  and 
from  them   several  of  the  ancient  fathers  of  the  Christian 
church  give   the  same  account  of  this  matter.*^     But  there 
are  unanswerable  objections  against  it;    for,     1st,    All  the 
letters  of  the  Hebrew  alphabet  are  not  to  be  found  in  these 
twelve  names,  four  of  them,  that  h,  Cheth,  Teth,  Zaddi,  and 
Koph,  being  wholly  wanting  in  them  ;  and  therefore  an  answer 
could  not  be  given  this  way  to  every  thing  concerning  which 
counsel  might  have  been  asked  of  God.     To  solve  this  they 
have  added  the  names  of  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob  to  the 
breastplate.     But  still  the  letter  Teth  will  be  wanting :  and 
therefore,  farther  to  botch  up  the  matter,  they  have  added 
also  these  words,  Col  elleh  shilte  Israel.,  i.  e.  All  these  are  the 
tribes  of  Israel.    But  this  is  not  only  without  any  foundation  in 
Scripture,  but  rather  contrary  to  it ;  for  the  description  of  the 
breastplate  in  Scripture  being  very  particular,  in  the  reckon- 
ing up  of  all  its  parts,  seems  plainly  to  exclude  whatever  is 
not  there  named.     2dly,  The  assertors  of  this  opinion  do 
not  tell  us  where  the  words  which   they  would  have  added 
were  placed  in  the  breastplate.     They  could  not  be  written 
or  engraven  on   the    breastplate  itself;  for  that  was  only  a 

X  Maitnonides  ill  Cele  Hammikdash,  c.  10,  sec.  11.  Zobar  in  Exodum. 
Talkut  ex  antique  libro  Siphie.  R,  Becai  in  Deut.  xsxiii.  8.  Rambao.  R. 
Levi  Ben  Geisoni.  Abarlianel.  R.  Azarias  in  meor  Enaiam,  R.  Abraham 
Seba,  aliique. 

y  Abarbanel  in  Legem,  Ramban  in  Legem.  »  z  Judges  i.  1,  2-. 

a  Antiq.  lib.  iii.  c.  9.  b  De  Monarchia,  lib.  3. 

e  Chrysostom.  Horn.  37.  adversus  Judseos  August.  lib.  2.  Questionum  su- 
pra E.vodum,  aliiqire 


BOOK  III.j  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  251 

piece  of  cloth.  They  must,  therefore,  be  engraven,  either 
on  some  of  the  twelve  stones,  or  else  on  others  set  there 
on  purpose  for  it.  They  could  not  be  on  any  of  the  twelve 
stones,  because  on  them  were  only  engraven  the  names  of 
the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel-,  and  they  could  not  be  on  other 
stones,  because  there  were  none  other  set  there,  but  these 
twelve  stones  only.  And  in  these  two  particulars  the  Scrip- 
tures are  sufficiently  positive  to  exclude  all  such  additions. 
3dly,  They  that  hold  this  opinion  are  forced  to  have  recourse 
to  the  spirit  of  prophecy  in  the  high-priest,  for  the  right 
combining  of  those  shining  and  protuberating  letters  that 
were  to  make  up  the  words  of  which  the  answer  did  consist ; 
which  is  a  difficulty  of  itself  alone  sufficient  to  explode  this 
conceit.  4thly,  There  were  some  answers  given  of  that 
length  (as  particularly  that  in  second  Samuel,  chap.  v.  23, 
24.)  that  all  the  letters  in  the  breastplate,  taking  in  all  those 
also  which  the  assertors  of  this  opinion  have  added,  will  not 
suffice  for  them. 

It  would  be  too  tedious  to  add  all  else  that  might  be  said 
to  shew  the  absurdity  of  this  opinion.  Dr.  Spencer  deser- 
vedly saith  of  it,  that  it  is  a  taimudical  camel,  which  no  one 
that  is  in  his  wits  can  ever  swallow. 

There  are  also  other  opinions  offered  by  others  concern- 
ing this  matter.  But  to  me  it  appears  plain  from  Scripture, 
that  when  the  high-priest  appeared  before  the  vail  to  ask 
counsel  of  God,  the  answer  was  given  him  by  an  audi- 
ble voice  from  the  mercy-seat,  which  was  within  behind 
the  vail.  There  it  was  that  Moses  went  to  ask  counsel 
of  God  in  all  cases,  and  from  thence  he  was  answered 
by  an  audible  voice  i*^  for  from  thence  God  communed 
with  him  of  all  those  things  which  he  gave  him  in  command- 
ment unto  the  children  of  Israel.  And  in  the  same  way  did 
God  afterward  communicate  his  will  to  the  governors  of 
Israel,  as  often  as  he  was  consulted  by  them,  only  with  this 
difference,  that  whereas  Moses,  through  the  extraordinary 
favour  that  was  granted  unto  him,  had  immediate  access  to 
the  divine  presence,  and  God  did  there  commune  with  him, 
and  speak  to  him,  as  it  were,  face  to  face,  as  a  man  speaketh 
to  his  friend,®  none  other  was  admitted  thither  to  ask  coun- 
sel of  him,  but  through  the  mediation  of  the  high-priest,*^  who 
in  his  stead  asked  counsel  for  him  by  Urim  and  Thwnmim. 
that  is,  by  presenting  himself  with  the  breastplate  on,  over 
all  his  other  robes,  before  the  vail,  exactly  over  against  the 
mercy-seat,  where  the  divine  presence  rested.  And  when 
he  thus  presented  himself  in  due  manner,  according  to  the 

d  Esod.  XXV.  22,    xxs.  6.    Numb.  vii.  89.  o  Exod.  xSxiii-  11. 

f  Numb,  xxvii.  21.    Judges  xs.2P, 


252  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HrSTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

prescription  of  the  divine  law,  God  gave  him  an  answer  in 
the  same  manner  as  he  did  unto  Moses,  that  is,  by  an  audible 
voice  from  the  mercy-seat.  For  in  many  instances,^  which 
we  have  in  Scripture,  of  God's  being  C(»n!Julled  this  way, 
the  answer  in  every  one  of  them,  except  two,  is  ushered  in 
with.  The  Lord  said ;^  and  when  the  Israelites  made  peace 
with  the  Gibeonites,  they  are  blamed  in  that  they  asked  not 
counsel  at  the  mouth  of  God ;'  both  which  phrases  seem 
plainly  to  express  a  vocal  answer ;  and,  taking  them  both 
together,  I  think  they  can  scarce  import  any  thing  else.  And 
for  this  reason  it  is,  that  the  holy  of  holies,  the  place  where 
the  ark  and  the  mercy-seat  stood,  from  whence  this  answer 
was  given,  is  so  often  in  Scripture  called  the  oracle,*^  be- 
cause from  thence  the  divine  oracles  of  God  were  uttered 
forth  to  those  that  asked  counsel  of  him. 

This,  1  take  to  be  plain,  was  the  manner  of  consulting 
God  by  Urim  and  Thuvimhnin  the  tabernacle  ;  but  how  it 
was  done  in  the  camp  raiseth  another  question  :  for  it  appear- 
eth  by  Scripture,  that  either  the  high-priest,  or  another  de- 
puted in  his  stead,  always  went  with  the  armies  of  Israel 
to  the  wars,  and  carried  with  him  the  ephod  and  breastplate, 
therewith  to  ask  counsel  of  God  by  Urim  and  Thummim  in 
all  difficult  emergencies  that  might  happen.  Thus  Fhinehas 
went  to  the  wars  against  the  Midianiies  with  the  holy  instru- 
ments^ that  is,  say  the  Jewish  commentators,™  with  the 
ephod  and  the  breastplate,  which  were,  say  they,  put  into 
an  ark  or  colTcr  made  on  purpose  for  it,  and  carried  by  Le- 
vites  on  their  shoulders,  as  the  other  ark  was.  And  of  this 
ark  they  understand  that  place  of  Scripture,  where  Saul 
saith  to  Ahiah  the  high-priest.  Bring  hither  the  ark  of  God  ^^ 
for  this  could  not  be  the  ark  of  the  covenant:  for  that  was 
then  atKirjath-jearim,  and  never  ought  to  have  been  removed 
from  its  place  in  the  tabernacle  to  be  carried  lo  the  wars, 
or  any  where  else  from  its  proper  station,  and  never  was  so 
but  once  against  the  Philistines;  and  then  God  gave  the 
armies  of  Israel,  and  also  the  ark  itself,  into  the  hands  of 
the  enemy,  for  the  punishment  hereof.  It  must  therefore 
have  been  no  other  ark  which  Saul  called  to  Ahiah  for,  than 
that  ark  or  cofler,  in  which  the  ephod  and  breastplate  were 
carried  ;  and  the  end  for  wfiich  he  called  for  it  shows  the 

gJuflgesi.  1,2;  xs.  18,23,  28.  1  Sam.  x.  22  ;  xxiii.  2,4,  11,  12.  2  Sam 
ii.  1  ;  V.  19,23. 

h  1  Sam.  XXX.  7,  8.     2  Sam.  xxi.  1.  1  Josli.  ix.  14. 

k  Psalm  xxviii.2.  1  Kings  vi.  5,  16,  19,  20—23,  31  ;  vii.  49;  viii.  6,8 
2  Chron.  iii.  16  ;  iv.  20  ;   v.  7,  9.  1  Numb.  xxxi.  6. 

m  Paraphrasis  Clialrlaica,  Jonathanis  Ben  Uzziel  Textum  interpretalur  his 
verbis.  Et  misit  eos  Moses,  et  Phineasum,  filium  Eleazaris  Sacerdotun:. 
ad  bcllum,  et  Urim  et  Tliuamim  Sanrtitati?  ad  interrogandiim  pf^r  pa 

n  1  Sam.  xiv.  IP. 


•JiOOK  in.]  THE    OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  263 

thing  ;  for  it  was  to  ask  counsel  of  God,  for  which  the  ephod 
and  breastplate  served.  So  that  the  saving  of  Saul  to 
Ahiah,  Bring  hither  the  ark,  importeth  no  more,  than  the 
saying  of  David  afterward  to  Abiathar  in  the  like  case, 
Bring  hither  the  ephod."  For  this  ark  was  the  coffer  in  which 
the  ephod  was  kept,  and  with  which  Abiathar  fled  to  David, 
when  Saul  destroyed  his  father's  house.  And  of  the  same 
ark  they  understand  the  saying  of  Uriah  the  Hittite  unto 
David,  when  he  excused  his  not  going  to  his  house,  and 
lying  with  his  wife.  '*  The  ark,  and  Israel,  and  Judah,  abide 
in  tents,  and  my  lord  Joab,  and  the  servants  of  my  lord,  are 
encamped  in  the  open  fields  ;  shall  1  then  go  into  my  house 
to  eat  and  to  drink,  and  to  lie  with  my  wife  ?"p  For  if  this 
be  understood  of  the  ark  of  the  covenant,  and  the  tent  or 
tabernacle  in  which  it  was  kept,  what  he  said  would  have 
been  a  reason  for  him  never  to  have  lain  with  his  wife  ;  for 
that  was  always  kept  in  such  a  tent  or  taberjiacle,  till  the 
temple  of  Solomon  was  built.  It  is  most  likely,  therefore, 
that  the  ark  which  he  speaks  of  was  the  ark  or  coffer,  in 
which  the  ephod  and  breastplate  were  put,  which  the  priest 
carried  with  him  v/ho  was  sent  to  the  war. 

The  priest  that  was  sent  on  this  occasion,  that  he  might 
be  fully  qualified  to  act  in  the  high-priest's  stead,  whenever 
there  should  be  occasion  for  him  to  ask  counsel  of  God  by 
l^rini  and  Thummim.,  was  consecrated  to  the  office  by  the 
holy  anointing  oil,'!  jn  the  same  manner  as  the  high-priest 
was  ;  and  therefore  he  was  called,  The  anointed  for  the  wars. 
But  how  he  had  the  answer  is  the  difficulty  ;  for  tiiere  was 
no  mercy-seat  in  the  camp  to  appear  before,  or  from  whence 
to  receive  the  oracle,  as  there  was  in  the  tabernacle.  And 
yet  that  such  oracles  were  given  in  the  camp  is  certain,  from 
several  instances  which  we  have  of  it  in  Scripture :  for 
David  did,  by  the  ephod  and  breastplate  only,  ask  counsel 
of  God  three  several  times,  in  the  case  of  Keilah  \^  and  twice 
at  Ziklag,'  once  on  the  pursuit  of  those  who  had  burned  that 
city,  and  again  on  his  going  from  thence  for  Hebron,  there  to 
take  possession  of  the  kingdom  of  Judah,  on  the  death  of 
Saul  ;  and  on  every  one  of  these  times  he  had  an  answer 
given  him,  though  it  is  certain  the  ark  of  the  covenant  was 
not  then  present  with  him.  It  is  most  likely,  since  God  al- 
lowed that  counsel  should  be  thus  asked  of  him  in  the  camp 
without  the  ark,  as  well  as  in  the/tabernacle  where  the  ark 
was,  that  the  answer  was  given  in  the  same  manner  by  an 
audible    voice.     It    seems    most    probable,   that    the    priest 

o  1  Sam.  xxiii.  9.  p  2  Sam.  xi.  H. 

q  Mairaonides  in  Cele  Hammikdasli,  c.  J,  sec.  7,  and  in  Melachim,  c.  T. 

r  1  Sam.  xxiii.  p  1  Sam.  xxx.  8.     2  Sam.  ii.  1 


^4  CONNEXION*  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I^ 

anointed  for  the  wars  had  a  tent  in  the  camp,  on  purpose 
there  erected  for  this  use,  in  which  a  part  was  separated  by 
a  vail,  in  the  same  manner  as  the  holy  of  holies  was  in  the 
tabernacle;  and  that,  when  he  asked  counsel  of  God  in  the 
camp,  he  appeared  there  before  that  vail  in  the  same  man- 
ner as  the  high-priest,  on  the  like  occasion,  did  before  that 
in  the  tabernacle,  ;tiid  that  the  answer  was  given  from  be- 
hind it,  though  no  ark  or  mercy-seal  was  there.  And  the 
words  of  Uriah  above  recited  plainly  refer  us  to  such  a  tent. 
And  it  cannot  be  agreeable  to  a  religion  of  so  much  ceremo- 
ny and  solemnity,  to  suppose  them  to  be  without  it  for  so 
sacred  an  office. 

Although  this  way  of  asking  counsel  of  God  was  frequent- 
ly used  during  the  tabernacle,  and  no  doubt  continued  after- 
ward till  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  by  the  Chaldeans,  yet 
we  have  no  instance  of  it  in  Scripture  during  the  whole  time 
of  the  first  temple  :  and  it  is  most  certain,  that  it  was  wholly- 
wanting  in  the  second  temple  :  for  both  Ezra  and  Nehemiah 
tell  us  as  much.*^  And  hence  is  that  saying  among  the  Jews, 
that  the  Holy  Spirit  spake  to  the  children  of  Israel  during 
the  tabernacle  by  Uriiii  and  Thummim,  and  under  the  first 
temple  by  the  prophets,  and  under  (he  second  by  Bath-kol." 

They  who  would  have  the  Urim  and  Tkununim  absolutely 
to  have  ceased  under  the  first  temple,  give  two  reasons  for 
it :  1 .  That  it  was  an  appendant  of  the  theocracy  -^  for  as  long 
as  God  was  the  immediate  governor  of  Israel,  it  was  neces- 
sary, say  they,  that  a  method  should  be  established,  whereby 
he  might  at  all  times  be  applied  to,  and  consulted  with  by 
his  people  ;  and  for  this  reason,  they  tell  us,  the  oracle  by 
Urim  and  Thummim  was  appointed.  But  when  the  theocracy 
ceased,  (which,  they  say,  it  did,  when  Solomon,  the  first 
hereditary  king,  sat  upon  the  throne,)  this  oracle  ceased 
with  it.  And,  2dly,  they  say,  that  the  Urim  and  Thummim 
was  established  to  ask  counsel  only  about  that  which  belonged 
to  the  common  interest  of  all  Israel ;  and  therefore,  whenever 
the  high-priest  asked  couiisel  of  God  this  way,  it  was  with 
the  names  of  all  the  tribes  of  Israel  upon  his  breast,  to  de- 
note that  what  was  asked  was  for  the  common  interest  of 
all  of  them.  But  that  common  interest  ceasing  upon  the 
division  of  the  kingdom,  this  way  of  asking  counsel  of  God 
must,  in  the  nature  of  the  thing,  have  then  ceased  also,  as 
being  no  longer  practicable.  But  how  far  these  arguments 
may  conclude,  is  left  to  every  one  to  consider. 

IV.  The  fourth  thing  wanting  in  the  second  temple,  which 

t  Ezra  ii.  63.     Neli.  vii.  65. 

u  By  this  the  Jews  mean  a  voice  from  the  clouds,  such  as  was  heard  from 
(hence  concerning  our  Saviour,  Matt.  iii.  7  ;  xviii.  5.    2  Pet.  i.  17. 
X  Spencerus  De  I'rim  et  Thummim.  c.  2,  sec.  2. 


'book  Hi. J  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  255 

was  in  the  first,  was  the  holy  fire,  which  came  down  from 
heaven  upon  the  altar.  It  descended  first  upon  the  altar  in 
the  tabernacle  at  the  consecrating  of  Aaron  and  his  sons  to 
the  priesthood/  and  afterward  it  descended  anew  upon  the 
altar  in  the  temple  of  Solomon,  at  the  consecrating  of  that 
temple.^  And  there  it  was  constantly  fed  and  maintained  by 
the  priests  day  and  night,  without  suffering  it  ever  to  go  out, 
in  the  same  manner  as  it  had  been  before  in  the  tabernacle, 
and  with  this  all  the  offerings  were  ofTered  that  were  made 
by  fire.  And  for  using  other  fire  were  Nadab  and  Abihu 
consumed  by  fire  from  the  Lord.  This,  say  some  of  the 
Jewish  writers,^  was  extinguished  in  the  days  of  Manasseh. 
But  the  more  general  opinion  among  them  is,  that  it  conti- 
nued till  the  destruction  of  the  temple  by  the  Chaldeans. 
After  that  it  was  never  more  restored  ;  but  instead  of  it  they 
had  only  common  fire  in  the  second  temple.  For  what  is 
said  of  its  being  hid  in  a  pit  by  Jeremiah,^  and  again  brought 
thence,  and  revived  upon  the  altar  in  the  second  temple,  is 
a  fable  that  deserves  no  regard. 

V.  The  fifth  thing  wanting  in  the  second  temple,  which 
was  in  the  first,  was  the  spirit  of  prophecy.  But  this  was  not 
wholly  wanting  there  :  for  the  prophets  Haggai,  Zechariah,. 
and  Malachi  lived  after  the  second  temple  was  built,  and 
prophesied  under  it.  But  on  their  death,  which  (say  the 
Rabbins)  happened  all  in  one  year,  the  prophetic  spirit 
wholly  ceased  from  among  them. 

Besides  these  five  things,  there  was  wanting  also  a  sixth, 
that  is,  the  holy  anointing  oil,"^  which  was  made  by  Moses  for 
the  anointing  and  consecrating  of  the  king,  the  high-priest, 
and  all  the  sacred  vessels  made  use  of  in  the  house  of  God^ 
And  for  this  use  it  was  commanded  to  be  kept  by  the  chil- 
dren of  Israel  throughout  their  generations.  And  therefore 
it  was  laid  up  before  tlvi  Lord  in  the  most  holy  place.  And 
as  the  original  copy  of  the  law  was  placed  there  on  the  right 
side  of  the  ark  of  the  covenant  ;  so  perchance  the  vessel 
containing  this  oil  was  placed  on  the  other  side  of  it,  and 
there  kept,  till,  the  first  temple  being  destroyed,  that  also 
was  destroyed  with  it.  Every  king  was  not  anointed,  but 
only  the  first  of  the  family  :'^  for  he  being  anointed  for  him- 
self, and  all  the  successors  of  his  race,  they  needed  no  other 
anointing  ;  only  if  there  arose  any  difficulty  or  dispute  about 
the  succession,  then  he  that  obtained  it,  though  of  the  same 
family,  was  anointed  anew  to  put  an  end  to  the  controversy, 

y  Lev.  ix.  24.  z  2  Chron.  vii.  1. 

a  Talmud  in  Zebachim,  cap.  6.  b  2  Mac.  i.  18,  IP, 

cExod.  XXX. 22— 33. 
i  Maimonides  in  Cele  HafliTiiikdash,  c.  1;  s«c.  11 


2a(i  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OF  [PARf  li 

and  after  that  no  one  was  to  question  the  title  :  and  this  was 
the  case  of  Solomon,  Joash,  and   Jehoahaz.      But  every 
high-priest  was   anointed  at  his  consecration,  or  first  admis- 
sion to  the  office,*  and  so  also  was  the  priest  that  went  in  his 
stead  to   the   wars/      The  vessels  and  utensils  that  were 
anointed  were  the  ark  of  the  covenant,  the  altar  of  incense, 
the  show-bread  table,  the  golden  candlestick,   the  altar  of 
burnt-otifering?,    the    laver,   and   all   the   other  vessels   and 
utensils  belonging  to  them.s     And  as  by  this  anointing  they 
■were  tirst  consecrated  at  the  erecting  of  the  tabernacle   by 
Moses, '^  so  in  case  any  of  them  were  afterward  decayed,  de- 
stroyed, or   lost,   they  could,  as   long  as  this  anointing  oil 
remained,  be  again  restored,   by   making  and  consecrating 
new  ones  in  their  place,  of  the  same  virtue  and  holiness  with 
the  former.     But  this  being  wanting  in  the  second  temple, 
the  want  hereof  caused  a  want  of  sanctity  in  all  things  else 
belonging  to  it :  for  altliough,  on  the  return  of  the  Jews  from 
the  Babylonish  captivity,  and  the  rebuilding  of  their  temple, 
they   did  anew  make   an  ark,  an  altar  of  incense,  a  show- 
bread  table,  a  golden  candlestick,  an  altar  of  burnt-oflferings, 
and  a  laver,  with  the  other  vessels  and  utensils  belonging  to 
them,  and  did  put  them  all  in  their  former  places,  and  ap- 
plied them  to  their  former  uses  ;    yet,  through  want  of  the 
holy  anointing  oil  to  consecrate  them,  these  all  wanted  that 
holiness  under  the  second  temple,  which  they  had  under  the 
first ;  and  their  high-priest,  who  officiated  in  that  temple,  was 
no  otherwise  consecrated,  than  by  the  putting  on  of  his  vest- 
ments.'    So  that  the  want  of  this  one  thing  only  in  the  second 
temple,  caused  a  great  want  and  defect  in  all  things  else  that 
were  therein  ;  every  thing  in  it  falling  short   of  its   former 
holiness  by  reason  hereof.     And  therefore  this  anointing  oil 
might   well,  under  the  second  temple,  have  been  reckoned 
among  the  principal  things  that  were  wanting  in  it.     But  the 
Jews  superstitiously   confine  themselves   to   the  number  of 
five  particulars  in  this  reckoning.     For,  in  the  eighth  verse 
of  the  first  chapter  of  Hagj^ai,  where  God  saithof  the  second 
temple,  J  7vill  take  pleasure  init^  and  will  be  glorified,  the  He- 
brew word  Aicabedha,  i.  e.  /  will  be  glorified,  being  written 
without  the  letter  He  at  the  end  of  it,  which  it  ought  to  have 
been  written  with,  they  make  a  mystery  of  it,  as  if  this  letter 
(which  is  the  numerical  letter  for  five,)  were  there  left  out 
for  this  purpose,  that  the  want  of  it  might  denote  the  five 
things  of  the  first  temple  that  were  wanting  in  the  second  ; 

e  Exod.  wj..  30.  f  Maimonides  in  Cele  Hammikdash,  c.  1.  sec,  7. 

2  Exod.  XXX.  26—29.       h  Exod.  xl. 

i  Maimonides  in  Cele  Hammikdash,  c.  1,  sec,  8 


BOOK  in.]     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  257 

and  therefore  will  not  add  a  sixth.''  But,  however,  there 
are  some  among  them,  who,  to  make  room  for  it,  contract 
the  Shechinah  and  the  spi7-it  of  prophecy  under  one  and  the 
same  head,  and,  instead  of  them  two,  (which  are  two  of  the 
particulars  above  mentioned,)  put  the  Holy  Spirit,  as  reckon-, 
ing  them  no  other  than  different  manifestations  of  the  same 
Holy  Spirit  of  God,  the  one  in  a  place,  and  the  other  in  a  per- 
son, and  thereby,  without  altering  the  number  of  five  in  the 
reckoning  up  of  these  defects,  have  given  the  holy  anointing 
oil  a  place  among  them  ;  and  therefore  name  them  as  fol- 
loweth  :^  1 .  The  ark  of  the  covenant,  with  the  mercy-seat ; 
2.  The  holy  fire  ;  3.  The  Urim  and  Thunimim.  4.  The  holy 
anointing  oil :  and,  5.  The  Holy  Spirit.  And  these,  as 
well  as  many  other  particulars  of  the  glory  of  the  first  temple, 
being  wanting  in  the  second,  there  was  reason  enough  for 
those  to  weep  at  the  rebuilding  of  the  second  temple"who 
remembered  the  first.  But  all  these  wants  and  defects  were 
abundantly  repaired  in  the  second  temple,  when  the  desire 
of  all  nations,  the  Lord,  whom  they  sought,^  came  to  this  his 
temple,  and  Christ  our  Saviour,  who  was  the  truest  Shechinah 
of  the  divine  majesty,  honoured  it  with  his  presence  ;  and, 
in  this  respect,  the  glory  of  the  latter  house  did  far  exceed 
the  glory  of  the  former  house.  And  herein  the  prophecies 
of  the  prophet  Haggai,"  which  foretold  it  should  be  so,  had 
a  very  full  and  thorough  completion. 

The  Samaritans,  hearing  that  the  Jews  had  begun  to  re- 
build the  temple  of  Jerusalem,  came  thither,  and,  ex- 
pressing a  great  desire  of  being  admitted  to  worship  cyru^s". 
God  at  the  same  temple  in  joint  communion  with 
them,  offered  to  join  with  them  in  building  of  it;  telling 
them,  that,  ever  since  the  days  of  Esarhaddon,  king  of  As- 
syria, they  had  worshipped  the  same  God  that  they  did." 
But  Zerubbabel  and  Jeshua,  and  the  rest  of  the  elders  of 
Israel,  made  answer  to  them,  that  they  not  being  of  the 
seed  of  Israel,  had  nothing  to  do  to  build  a  temple  to  their 
God  with  them ;  that  Cyrus's  commission  being  only  to 
those  of  the  house  of  Israel,  they  would  keep  themselves 
exactly  to  that,  and,  according  to  the  tenor  of  it,  build  the 
house  to  the  Lord  their  God  themselves,  without  admitting 
any  other  with  them  into  the  work.  The  reason  of  this  an- 
swer was,  they  saw  they  intended  not  sincerely  what  they 
said,  but  came  with  an  insidious  design  to  get  an  opportunity, 
by  being  admitted  among  them,  of  doing  them  mischief. 
And  besides,  they  were  not  truly  of  their  religion  :  for,  al- 
though from  the  time  that  they  had  been  infested  with  lions 

k  Talmud  Hierosol.  in  Taanith,  c.  2.  I  Mai.  iii.  1.    Hag.  ii.  7. 

m  Hag.  ii.  9.  n  Ezra  iv. 

Vol.  I.  33 


258  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PAUT  I. 

in  the  days  of  Esarhaddon,  they  had  worshipped  the  God  of 
Israel;  yet  it  was  only  in  conjunction  with  their  other  gods," 
whom  they  worshipped  before,  and  therefore,  notwithstand- 
ing their  worship  of  the  true  God,  since  they  worshipped 
false  gods  too  at  the  sanne  time,  they  were  in  this  respect 
idolaters :  and  this  was  reason  enough  for  the  true  worship- 
pers of  God  to  have  no  communion  with  ihem.  At  which 
the  Samaritans  being  much  incensed,  they  did  all  they  could 
to  hinder  the  work  ;  and  although  they  could  not  alter 
Cyrus's  decree,  yet  they  prevailed,  by  bribes  and  underhand 
dealings  with  his  ministers,  and  other  officers  concerned 
herein,  to  put  obstructions  to  the  execution  of  it,  so  that  for 
several  years  the  building  went  but  very  slowly  on  ;P  which 
the  Jews  resenting,  according  as  it  deserved,  this  became 
the  beginning  of  that  bitter  rancour  which  hath  ever  since 
been  between  them  and  the  Samaritans ;  which,  being  im- 
proved by  other  causes,  grew  at  length  to  that  height,  that 
nothing  became  more  odious  to  a  Jew  than  a  Samaritan  ; 
of  which  we  have  several  instances  in  the  gospels;  and  so  it 
still  continues.  For,  even  to  this  day,  a  Cuthean  (that  is,  a 
Samaritan)  in  their  language,  is  the  most  odious  name  among 
them,  and  that  which,  in  the  height  of  their  anger,  by  way 
of  infamy  and  reproach,  they  bestow  on  those  they  most 
hate  and  abominate.  And  by  this  they  commonly  call  us 
Christians,  when  they  would  express  the  bitterest  of  their 
hatred  against  us. 

By  these  underhand  and  subdolous  dealings,  the  work  of 
the  temple  being  much  retarded,  and  Cyrus's  decree  in  many 
particulars  defeated  of  its  effect,  this  seems  to  have  been  the 
cause,  that  in  the  third  year  of  Cyrus,  in  the  first  month  of 
that  year,  Daniel  did  give  himself  up  to  mourning  and  fasting 
for  three  weeks  together.''  After  this,  on  the  twenty-fourth 
day  of  that  month,  he  saw  the  vision  concerning  the  suc- 
cession of  the  kings  of  Persia,  the  empire  of  the  Macedo- 
nians, and  the  conquests  of  the  Romans  ;  of  which  the  three 
last  chapters  of  his  prophecies  contain  an  account.  And, 
by  what  is  written  in  the  conclusion  of  the  last  of  them,  he 
seems  to  have  died  soon  after;  and  his  great  age  makes  it 
not  likely  that  he  could  have  survived  much  longer.  For 
the  third  of  Cyrus  being  the  seventy-third  year  of  his  cap- 
tivity, if  he  were  eighteen  years  old  at  his  carrying  to  Baby- 
lon (as  I  have  shown  before,  is  the  least  that  can  be  suppo- 
sed,) he  must  have  been  in  the  ninety-first  year  of  his  age 
at  this  time  ;  which  was  a  length  of  years  given  to  few  in 
those  days.     He   was  a  very  extraordinary  person  both  in 

o  2  Kings  xvii.  3. 

p  Ezra  iv,  5.    Joseph  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  2.  q  Dan.  x. 


BOOJK  111.3  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  25if 

wisdom  and  piety,  and  was  favoured  of  God,  and  honoured 
of  men,  beyond  any  that  had  hved  in  his  time.     His  prophe- 
cies concerning  the  coming  of  the  Messiah,  and  other  great 
events  of  after-times,  are  the  clearest  and  the  fullest  of  all 
that  we  have  in  the  holy  Scriptures,  insomuch  that  Porphyry, "■ 
in  his  objections  against  them,  saith,  they  must  have  been 
written  after  the  facts  were  done  :    for  it  seems  they  rather 
appeared  to  him  to  be  a  narration  of  matters  afore  transact- 
ed, than  a  prediction  of  things  to  come ;    so  great  an  agree- 
ment was  there  between  the  facts,  when  accomplished,  and 
the  prophecies  which  foretold  them.      But,  notwithstanding 
all  this,  the  Jews  do  not  reckon  him  to  be  a  prophet  f    and 
therefore  place  his  prophecies  only  among  the  Hagiographa  : 
and  they  serve  tb  ■   Psalms  of  David  after  the   same   rate. 
The  reason  which  chey  give  for  it  in  respect  of  both  is,  that 
they  lived  not  the  prophetic  manner  of  life,  but  the  courtly  ; 
David  in  his  own  palace,  as  king  of  Israel,  and  Daniel  in  the 
palace  of  the  king  of  Babylon,  as  one  of  his  chief  counsel- 
lors and  ministers  in  the  government  of  that  empire.*     And, 
in  respect  of  Daniel,  they  further  add,  that,  although  he  had 
divine  revelations  delivered  unto  him,  yet  it  was  not  in  the 
prophetic   way,  but   by  dreams   and   visions   of  the   night, 
which    they    reckon  to  be  the  most  imperfect  manner   of 
revelation,  and   below  the  prophetic."     I3ul  Josephus,  who 
was  one  of  the  ancientest  writers  of  that  nation,  reckons 
him  among  the  greatest  of  the  prophets  ;  and  says  further  of 
him,  that  he  had  familiar  converse  with  God,  and  did  not 
only  foretell  future  events,  as  other  prophets  did,  but  also 
determined  the  time  when  they  should  come  to  pass  ;    and 
that,  whereas   other  prophets  only  foretold  evil  things,  and 
thereby  drew  on  them  the  ill  will  both  of  princes  of  people, 
Daniel  was  a  prophet  of  good  things  to  come,  and,  by  the 
good  report  which  his  predictions  carried  with  them  on  this 
account,  reconciled   to  himself  the  good  will  of  all  men.^ 
And  the  event  of  such  of  them  as  were  accomplished,  pro- 
cured to  the   rest  a  thorough  belief  of  their  truth,  and  a 
general  opinion  that  they  came  from  God.     But  what  makes 
most  for  this  point  with  us,  against  all  that  contradict  it,  our 
Saviour  Christ  acknowledgeth  Daniel  to  be  a  prophet;    for 
he  so  styles  him  in  the  gospel. ^     And  this  is  a  sufficient  de- 
cision of  this  matter. 

r  Hieronymus  in  Procemio  ad  Comment,  in  Danielem. 

s  Hieronymi  Praefatio  in  Danielem.  Maimonides  in  Moreh  Nevoehim, 
part  2,  c.  45. 

t  Vide  Grotium  in  Praefatione  ad  Comment,  in  Esaiam,  et  Huetii  denion- 
strationem  Evangelicum,  prop.  4,  c.  14,  sec.  de  propheta  Danielis. 

u  Maimonides,  ibid.  David  Kimcbi  in  Praefatione  ad  Comment,  in  Psalmos. 

X  Antit}.  lib.  10,  c.  13.  y  Matt.  x^iv.  15. 


260  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OP  [PART  X. 

But  Daniel's  wisdom  reached  not  only  to  things  divine  and 
political,  but  also  to  arts  and  sciences,  and  particularly  to 
that  of  architecture.  And  Josephus  tells  us  of  a  famous 
edifice  built  by  him  at  Susa,  in  the  manner  of  a  castle,  (which 
he  saith  was  remaining  to  his  time,)  and  finished  with  such 
wonderful  art,  that  it  then  seemed  as  fresh  and  beautiful  as 
if  it,  had  been  newly  built/  Within  this  edifice,  he  saith, 
Vas  the  place  where  the  Persian  and  Parthian  kings  used  to 
be  buried  ;  and  that,  for  the  sake  of  the  founder,  the  keeping 
of  it  was  committed  to  one  of  the  Jewish  nation,  even  to 
his  time.  The  copies  of  Josephus  that  are  now  extant,  do 
indeed  place  this  building  in  Ecbatana  in  Media  ;  but  St. 
Jerome,''  who  gives  us  the  same  account  of  it  word  for  word 
out  of  Josephus,  and  professeth  so  to  do,  placeth  it  in  Susa 
in  Persia  ;  which  makes  it  plain,  that  the  copy  of  Josephus, 
which  he  made  use  of,  had  it  so  :  and  it  is  most  likely  to  have 
been  the  true  reading;  for  Susa  being  within  the  Babylonish 
empire,  the  Scripture  tells  us,  that  Daniel  had  sometimes 
his  residence  there  y'  and  the  common  tradition  of  those 
parts  hath  been  for  many  ages  past,  that  Daniel  died  in  that 
city,*^  which  is  now  called  Tnster,  and  there  they  show  his 
monument  even  to  this  day.  And  it  is  to  be  observed,  that 
Josephus  calls  this  building  Baris,  v/hich  is  the  same  name 
by  which  Daniel  himself  calls  the  castle  or  palace  at  Shushan 
or  Susa.  For  what  we  translate,  at  Shushan  in  the  palace,'' 
is,  in  the  original,  Beshushan  Habirah,  where,  no  doubt,  the 
Birah  of  Daniel  is  the  same  with  the  Baris  of  Josephus  ; 
and  both  signify  this  palace  or  castle  there  built  by  Daniel, 
while  he  was  governor  of  that  province  :  for  there  he  did  the 
king's  business,^  i.  e.  was  governor  for  the  king  of  Babylon. 

Part  of  the  book  of  Daniel  is  originally  written  in  the 
Chaldee  language,  that  is,  from  the  fourth  verse  of  the  second 
chapter  to  the  end  of  the  seventh  chapter:  for  there  the 
holy  prophet,  treating  of  Babylonish  affairs,  he  wrote  of 
them  in  the  Chaldee  or  Babylonish  language.  All  the  rest  is 
in  Hebrew.  The  Greek  translation  of  this  book,  used  by  the 
Greek  churches,  through  all  the  eastern  countries,  was  that 
which  was  translated  by  Theodotion.'  In  the  vulgar  Latin 
edition  of  the  Bible,  there  is  added  in  the  third  chapter, 
after  the  twenty-third  verse,  between  that  and  the  twenty- 
fourth  verse,  the  song  of  the  Three  Children  ;  and,  at  the 
end  of  the  book,  the  history  of  Susanna,  and  of  Bel  and  the 

z  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  12.  a  Comment  in  Dan.  viii.  2. 

b  Susa,  or  Shushan.  c  Benjaminis  Itinirarium, 

d  Dan.  viii.  2.  e  Dan.  viii.  27. 

f  Hieronymus  in  Prsefatione  ad  Danieleo)  et  in  Prooemio  ad  Comment,  in 
eundem. 


BOOK  in.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS,  261 

Dragon;  and  the  former  is  made  the  thirteenth  and  the 
other  the  fourteenth  chapter  of  the  book  in  that  edition. 
But  these  additions  were  never  received  into  the  canon  of 
holy  writ  bv  the  Jewish  church;  neither  are  they  extant 
either  in  the  Hebrew  or  the  Chaldee  language  5  nor  is  there 
any  evidence  thai  they  ever  were  so.s  That  th<'re  are  He- 
braisms in  ihem  can  prove  no  more,  than  that  thty  were  writ- 
ten by  an  Hebrew  in  the  Greek  tongiie,  who  transferred  the 
idio  ns  of  his  own  tongue  into  that  which  he  wrote  in.  as  is 
usual  in  this  case.  And  that  tht  y  were  thus  originally  writ- 
ten in  the  Greek  tongue  by  some  Hellenistical  Jew,  without 
having  any  higher  fountain  from  whence  they  are  derived, 
appears  from  this,  that  in  the  history  of  Susanna,  Daniel,  in 
his  replies  to  the  elders,  alludes  to  the  Grefk  names  of  the 
trees,  under  which,  they  said,  the  adultery,  which  they 
charged  Susanna  with,  was  committed ;''  which  allusions 
cannot  hold  good  in  any  other  lariguage.  However,  the 
church  of  Rome  allows  them  to  be  of  the  same  authority 
with  the  rest  of  the  book  of  Daniel,  and,  by  their  decree  at 
Trent,'  having  given  them  an  equal  place  with  it  among  the 
canonical  Scriptures.  But  the  ancients  never  did  so.  Afri- 
canus,  Eusebius,  and  Appolinarius,  have  rejected  those 
pieces,  not  only  as  being  uncanonical,  but  also  as  fabulous  ; 
and  Jerome"^  gives  the  history  of  Bel  and  the  Dragon  no 
better  title  than  that  of  the  fables  of  Bel  and  the  Dragon.* 
And  others  who  have  been  content  to  admit  them  for  instruc- 
tion of  manners,  have  yet  rejected  them  from  being  parts  of 
the  canonical  Scripture  ;  whom  the  Protestant  churches  fol- 
lowing htrein,  do  give  them  a  place  in  their  Bibles  among 
the  apocryphal  writings,  but  allow  them  not  to  be  cano- 
nical. 

In  the  death  of  Daniel,  the  Jews  having  lost  a  powerful 
advocate  in  the  Persian  court,  this  gave  their  enemies  the 
greater  advantage  of  succeeding  in  their  designs  against 
them.  But  although  they  prevailed  by  underhand  dealings 
to  divert  those  encouragements  which  Cyrus  had  ordered 
for  the  carrying  on  of  the  work,  yet  they  could  not  put  an 
open  stop  to  it.     So  that,  as  far  as  the  Jews  of  themselves 

g  Hieronymus.  ibid. 

h  In  the  examination  of  the  elders,  when  one  of  them  said,  Thathe.saw 
the  adultery  commilteil  \nro  o-^ivsi',  i.  e  under  a  maslich-tree.  Daniel  answers 
in  allusion  to  tryji'^v.  The  angel  of  God  halli  received  sentence  of  God  a-^iirau  <n 
fAiTovi  i.  e.  to  cut  thee  in  two.  And  when  the  other  elder  said  it  was  i/a-o  Trpniv, 
i.  e.  under  an  holm-tree.  Daniel  answers  in  allusion  to  the  word  Trpivcv,  The 
angel  of  the  Lord  waiteth  with  the  sword  Trptirnt  <Ti  y.ia-01,  i.  e.  to  cut  thee  in  two. 
Vide  Hieron.  ibid. 

i  Sessione  4ta.  k  Hieronymus,  ibid. 

1  Peter  Comestor  doth  also  so  call  them,  as  doth  likewise  Erasmus  ia  Scol. 
super  Preef.  Hieronymi  in  Danielem. 


262  CONNEXION   OP  THE  HISTORY   OF  [PART  I. 

were  able,  they  still  carried  on  the  work  ;   in  which   they 
were  much  helped  by  the  Tyrians  and  the  Zidonians,™  not 
only  in  furnishing  the  n  with  masons,  and  other  workmen  and 
artificers,  but  chiefly  in  bringing  the  cedars,  which  C^rus  had 
givt^M  them,  out  of  the  forest  of  mount  Libanuf>,  from  thence 
to   Joppa   by  sea  ;   from  which  place  they  were   carried  by 
land  to  Jerusalem.       For  the  Txrians  and  Zidonians,  being 
wholl)  given  to  tratHc  and  navigation,  did  very  little  addict 
themselves   to  the  planiing   of  oliv(;yards,  or  vineyards,  or 
the  tillage  of  the  ground  ;    neither  had  they  indeed  any  ler- 
ritory  for  either:  for  their  gain  being  very  ^^reat  by  sea,  they 
did  not  set  themselves   to   make  any  enlargements  by  land, 
but  were  in  a  marmer  pent  up  within  the  narrow   preciiicts 
of  the  cities  in   which  they   dwt^lt  ;    and   therefore,  having 
very  little  of  corn,  wine,  or  oil  of  their  own,  they  depended 
mostly  on  their  neighbours  for  these  provisions  ;  from  whom 
they  had  them  either  for  their  money,  or  by  way  of  barter 
and  exchange  tor  other  commodities,  which  they  supplied 
them   with,  and  they  were  mostly  furnished  this  way  out  of 
the  Jews'  country,"  and  therefore  they  readily  assisted  them 
with   their  labour  and  shipping,  to  be  supplied   with  these 
necessarirs  in  exchange  for  it.     So  that  as  it  was  by  their 
help  that  Solomon  built  the  first  temple;    so  also  was  it  by 
their  help  that  the  Jews  were  enabled  to  build  the  second. 
In  the  seventh  year  after  the  restoration  of  ihe  Jews  died 
Cyrus,"  their  great   benefactor,  after  he  had  reigned, 
Oy'ra^-T.  ^t^ovci  his  first  taking  on  him  the  command  of  the  Per- 
sian and  Median  armies  thirty  years  ;P  from  his  taking 
of  Babylon  nine  years  \'^  and  from  his  biding  sole  monarch  of 
the  East,  after  the  death  of  Cyaxares.  or  Darius  the  Median, 
his  uncle,  seven  years  ;'^  being  at  the  time  of  his  death  seventy 
years  old.     There  are  diiferent  accounts  of  the  manner  of 
his  death.     Herodotus,'  Diodorus  Siculus,*  and  Justin."  tell 
us,  that,  having  invaded  the  Scythian^,  he  was  there  cut   off 
with  all  his  army,  consisting  of  two  hundred  thousand  men. 
But  Xenophon  makes  him  die  in  hi^  bed  is  fortunately  as  he 
lived,  amidst   Ins  friends,  and  in  his  own  country  :^  and  this 
is  by  much  thv  more  probable  account  of  the  two  ;  for  it  is  by 
no  means   likely  that  so  wise  a  man  as  Cyrus,  and  so  ad- 
vanced in  years  as  he  then  was,  should  engage  in  so  rash  an 
undertaking,  as  that    Scythian  expedition  is  described  to  be 
by  those  who  tell  us  of  it.     Neither  can  it  be  conceived  how, 

mEzraiii.  7.  n  Acts  xii.  20. 

o  Cyrotiedia,  lib.  8.  p  Cicero  de  Divinatione,  lib.  1. 

qCan.  Ptoleuiaei.  r  (  yropedia,  lib.  8. 

s  Lib.  1.  t  Lib.  2,  p.  90. 

n  Lib.  1.  c.  8.  x  Cyropedia,  lib.  8. 


KOOK  HI.]  THE  0LD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  2G3 

after  such  a  blow,  his  new-erected  empire  could  have  been 
upheld,  especially  in  the  hands  of  such  a  successor  as  Cam- 
byses  was,  or  how  it  could  be  possible,  that  he  should  so  soon 
after  it  be  in  a  condition  to  wage  such  a  war  as  he  did  with 
the  Egyptians,  and  make  such  an  absolute  conquest  of  that 
country  as  he  did.  That  such  a  wild-headed  man  could 
settle  himself  :iO  easily  in  his  father's  new-erected  empire, 
and  hold  it  in  such  quiet  at  home,  and  so  soon  after  his  com- 
ing to  it,  enlarge  it  with  such  conquests  abroad,  could  cer- 
tainly be  owing  to  nothing  else,  but  that  it  was  founded  in 
the  highest  wisdom,  and  left  to  him  in  the  highest  tranquilli- 
ty. Besides,  all  authors  agree,  that  Cyrus  was  buried  at  Pa- 
sargada  in  Persia  ;^'  in  which  country,  Xenophon  saith,  he 
died,  and  his  monument  there  continued  to  the  time  of  Alex- 
ander. But  if  he  had  been  slain  in  Scythia,  and  his  body 
there  mangled  by  way  of  indignity  to  it,  in  such  a  manner  as 
Herodotus  and  Justin  do  relate,  how  can  we  suppose  it 
could  ever  have  been  brought  thence  out  of  the  hands  of 
those  enraged  barbarians  to  be  buried  at  Pasargada  ? 

This  Cambyses,  who  succeeded  his  father  Cyrus,  is  in 
Scripture  called  Ahasuerus.^  As  soon  as  he  was  set- 
tled in  the  throne,  the  enemies  of  the  Jews  knowing  (^ambysfsii 
him  to  be  of  a  temper  fit  to  be  worked  upon  for  the 
doing  of  mischief,  instead  of  opposing  the  Jews  in  their 
building  of  the  temple  by  secret  machinations,  and  under- 
hand dealings  with  the  ministers  of  the  court,  and  other 
subordinate  officers,  as  they  had  hitherto  done,  they  now 
openly  addressed  to  the  king  himself  to  put  a  stop  to  the 
work.  But  it  seems  he  had  so  much  respect  for  the  memory 
of  his  father,  that  he  could  not  be  induced  publicly  to  revoke 
his  decree.  However,  he  otherwise  defeated  in  a  great 
measure  the  design  of  it,  by  several  discouragements  which 
he  put  upon  it;  so  that  the  work  went  but  heavily  forward 
all  his  reign. 

Cambyses  had  not  longbeen  king,  ere  he  resolved  upon  a  war 
with  the  Egyptians,  b)  reason  of  some  offence  taken 
against  Amasis  their  king.^  Herodotus  tells  us  it  was  c^"bys«2! 
because  Amasis,  when  he  desired  of  him  one  of  his 
daughters  to  wife,  sent  him  a  daughter  of  Apries,  instead  of 
one  of  his  own.  But  this  could  not  be  true,  because  Apries 
having  been  dead  above  forty  years  before,  no  daughter  of 
bis  could  be  young  enough  at  that  time  to  be  acceptable  to 
Cambyses.     They  speak  with  more  probability,  who  say,  it 

y  Strabo.  lib.  16,  p.  730.    Plutarchus  in  vita  Alexandri,  Q.  Curtius,  Arria- 
nus,  aliique. 
z  Ezra  iv.  6. 
a  Herodotus,  lib.  2.    Justin,  lib.  1,  c.  9.    Athenaens,  lib,  ]3,  p.  560- 


264  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OP  [PART  I. 

was  Cyrus,  and  not  Cambyses,  to  whom  this  daughter  of 
Apries  was  sent.*'  Her  name,  they  say,  was  Nitetis;  and  for 
some  time  she  concealed  her  true  parentage,  and  was  content 
to  go  for  the  daughter  of  Amasis.  Bui,  at  length,  having 
had  several  children  by  Cyrus,  and  fully  secured  herself  in 
his  favour  and  afifection.  she  discovered  to  him  the  whole 
truth  of  the  matter,  and  excited  him  all  she  could  to  revenge 
upon  Amasis  her  father's  wrong;  which  he  intended  to  have 
done,  as  soon  as  his  other  affairs  would  have  permitted  ;  but 
dying  before  he  could  execute  his  intentions,  Cambyses  (who 
they  say  was  her  son)  undertook  the  quarrel  on  her  account, 
and  made  this  war  upon  Egypt  for  no  other  reason  than  to 
revenge  upon  Amasis  the  case  of  Apries.  But  it  is  most 
likely,  that  whereas  Amasis  had  subjected  himself  to  Cyrus, 
and  become  his  tributary,  he  did  on  his  death  withdraw  his 
obedience  from  his  successor,  and  that  this  was  the  true  cause 
of  the  war;  for  the  carrying  on  whereof  Cambyses  made 
great  preparations  both  by  sea  and  land/  For  the  sea-ser- 
vice, he  engaged  the  Cypriots  and  the  Phoenicians  to  help 
him  with  their  fleets  ;  and  for  the  war  by  land,  besides  his 
other  forces,  he  had  a  great  number  of  Greeks,  lonians,  and 
iEolians,  in  his  army,  who  were  the  main  strength  of  it.  But 
the  greatest  help  he  had  in  this  war,  was  from  Phanes,  a  Hali- 
carnassian,  who  being  a  commander  of  some  of  the  Grecian 
auxiliaries  that  were  in  the  service  of  Amasis,  on  some  disgust 
given  him,  revolted  to  Cambyses,  and  made  those  discoveries 
to  him,  of  the  nature  of  the  country,  the  strength  of  the 
enemy,  and  the  then  state  of  their  affairs,  as  chiefly  conduced 
to  the  making  of  that  expedition  successful.  And  it  was  by 
his  advice,  that  Cambyses  contracted  with  the  Arabian  king 
that  lay  next  the  borders  of  Palestine  and  Egypt,  to  supply 
him  with  water,  while  he  passed  the  deserts  that  lay  between 
these  two  countries ;  where  accordingly  it  was  brought  him 
on  camels'  backs  ;  without  which  he  could  never  have  march- 
ed his  army  that  way.     Being  therefore  thus  prepared  he 

invaded  Egypt  in  the  fourth  year  of  his  reign.  On  his 
c^mbyMs4".  arrival  on  the  borders,  he  found  Amasis  was  newly 

dead,  and  that  Psammenitus  his  son,  being  made  king 
in  his  stead,  was  drawing  together  a  great  army  to  oppose 
him.  To  make  his  passage  open  into  the  country,  it  was 
necessary  for  him  to  take  Pelusium,  which  was  as  the  key  of 
Egypt  on  that  side.  But  that  being  a  strong  place,  it  was 
like  to  give  him  much  trouble  :  for  the  preventintj  hereof, 
by  the  counsel,  it  is  supposed  of  Phanes,  he  had  recourse  to 

b  Polyaenus  Stratagem,  lib.  8,  et  ^gyptii  apud  Herodotum,  lib.  3,  in  initio 
Atbenacus,  ibid, 
c  Herodotus,  lib.  3. 


T.OOK  III.}  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAilgNTS.  265 

this  stratagem.  Finding  that  the  garrison  were  all  Egyptians, 
JH  an  assault,  which  he  made  upon  the  city,  he  placed  a 
great  number  of  cats,  dogs,  sheep,  and  other  of  those  ani- 
mals which  the  Egyptians  reckoned  sacred,  in  the  front  of 
the  army  ;  and  therefore  the  soldiers,  not  daring  to  throw  a 
dart,  or  shoot  an  arrow  that  way,  for  fear  of  killing  some  of 
those  animals,  Cambyses  made  himself  master  of  the  place 
without  any  opposition  :^  for  these  being  the  gods  which  the 
Egyptians  then  adored,*^  it  was  reckoned  the  highest  impiety 
to  kill  any  of  them,  and,  when  they  died  of  themselves,  they 
buried  them  with  the  greatest  solemnity.  By  the  time  that 
Cambyses  had  taken  this  place,  Psammenitus  came  up  witlV 
his  army  to  oppose  his  farther  progress;  whereon  ensued  a 
bloody  battle  between  them/  At  the  beginning  of  it,  the 
Greeks  that  were  in  Psammenitus's  army,  to  be  revenged  on 
Phanes  for  his  revolt  to  the  enemy,  brought  forth  his  chil- 
dren (whom  he  was  forced  to  leave  behind  him  on  his  flight,) 
and  slew  them  in  the  front  of  the  battle,  in  sight  of  both  ar- 
mies, and  drank  their  blood.  But  this  served  them  not  in 
any  stead  for  the  victory  :  for  the  Persians,  being  exasper- 
ated by  a  spectacle  of  so  horrid  a  nature,  fell  on  with  such 
fury  and  rage  to  revenge  it,  that  they  soon  vanquished  and 
overthrew  the  whole  Egyptian  army,  and  cut  the  greatest 
part  of  them  in  pieces.  The  remainder  fled  to  Memphis : 
where  Cambyses  pursuing  them,  on  his  arrival  thither,  sent 
into  the  city  by  the  Nile,  on  which  it  stood,  a  ship  of  Mity- 
lene,  with  an  herald  to  summon  them  to  a  surrender ;  but 
the  people  rising  on  him,  in  their  rage  slew  the  herald, 
and  tore  him  and  all  that  v.'ere  with  him  to  pieces.  But 
Cambyses,  after  a  short  siege  having  taken  the  place,  suffi- 
ciently revenged  their  death,  causing  ten  Egyptians  of  the 
first  rank  to  be  publicly  executed  for  every  one  of  those  that 
were  thus  slain ;  and  the  eldest  son  of  Psammenitus  was 
one  of  the  number.  As  to  Psammenitus  himself,  Cambyses 
was  inclined  to  have  dealt  kindly  with  him  :  for  at  first  he 
gave  him  his  life,  and  allowed  him  wherewith  honourably  to 
live  ;  but  he  not  being  contented  herewith,  endeavoured  to 
raise  new  troubles  for  the  recovery  of  his  crown  ;  whereon 
he  was  forced  to  drink  bull's  blood,  and  so  ended  his  life. 
His  reign  was  only  six  months.  For  so  much  time  only  inter- 
vened from  the  death  of  his  father  to  the  taking  of 
Memphis  ;  when  he  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  enemy,  cambysSsl 
and  all  his  power  ceased  ;  for  hereon  all  Egypt  sub- 
mitted to  Cambyses.     This  happened  in  the  fifth  year  of  his 

d  Polysenus,  lib.  7. 

e  Herodotus,  lib.  2.    Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  1.  p.  52. 
f  HerodotuS;  lib.  3, 
Vor,.  r.     '  34 


266  CONNEXION  or  the  history  of  [part  i^ 

reign ;  and  he  reigned  three  years  after.  The  Lybians, 
CyrenianSj  and  Barceans,  hearing  of  this  success,  sent  an>- 
bassadors  with  presents  to  make  their  submission  to  him. 
From  Memphis  he  went  to  Sais,  where  the  Egyptian  kings, 
for  several  descents  past,  had  kept  their  usual  residence ; 
and  there,  entering  into  the  palace,  caused  the  body  of 
Amasis  to  be  dug  out  of  his  grave,  and,  after  all  manner  of 
indignities  had  been  offered  thereto  in  his  presence,  he  or- 
dered it  to  be  cast  into  the  fire  and  burned.  Which  rage 
against  the  carcase  showeth  the  anger  which  he  had  against 
the  rnan  ;  and,  whatsoever  it  was  that  provoked  it,  this  seems 
to  be  the  cause  that  brought  him  into  Egypt. 

The  next  year,  which  was  the  sixth  of  his  reign,  he 
designed  three  expeditions,  the  first  against  the 
cainbysesl^'  Carthaginians,  the  second  against  the  Hammonians, 
and  the  third  against  the  Ethiopians.  But  the 
Phoenicians  refusing  to  assist  him  against  the  Carthaginians, 
who  were  descended  from  them,  (they  being  a  colony  of  the 
Tyrians,)  and  not  being  able  to  carry  on  that  war  without 
them,  he  was  forced  to  drop  this  project.  But,  his  heart 
being  intent  upon  the  other  two,  he  sent  ambassadors  into 
Ethiopia,  who,  under  that  name,  were  to  serve  him  as  spies, 
to  learn  and  bring  him  an  account  of  the  state  and  strength 
of  the  country.  But  the  Ethiopians,  being  fully  apprised  of 
the  end  of  their  coming,  treated  them  with  great  contempt. 
And  the  Etiiiopian  king,  in  return  for  the  present  they 
brought  him  from  Cambyses,  sent  him  back  only  his  bow,  ad- 
.  vising  him  then  to  make  war  upon  the  Ethiopians,  when  the 
Persians  could  as  easily  draw  that  bow  as  they  could  ;  and 
in  the  mean  time  to  thank  the  gods,  that  they  never  inspired 
the  Ethiopians  with  a  desire  of  extending  their  dominions 
beyond  the  limits  of  their  own  country.  With  which  an- 
swer Cambyses  being  exceedingly  exasperated,  immediately 
on  the  receipt  of  it,  in  a  mad  irrational  humour,  commanded 
his  army  forthwith  to  march,  (without  considering,  that  they 
were  furnished  neither  with  provisions  nor  any  other  neces- 
saries for  such  an  expedition,)  leaving  only  the  Grecian  auxi- 
liaries behind,  to  keep  the  country  in  awe  during  his  absence. 
On  his  coming  to  Thebes,  in  the  Upper  Egypt,  he  detached 
from  his  army  fifty  thousand  men  to  go  against  the  Hammo- 
nians, with  orders  to  destroy  their  country,  and  burn  the  tem- 
ple of  Jupiter  Hammon  that  stood  in  it.  But,  after  several 
days  march  over  the  desert?,  a  strong  and  impetuous  wind 
beginning  to  blow  from  the  south,  at  the  time  of  their  dinner, 
raised  the  sands  to  such  a  degree,  and  brought  them  in  such 
a  torrent  upon  them,  that  the  whole  army  was  overwhelmed 
thereby,  and   perished.     Tn  the  interim  Cambyses   madly 


BOOK  III.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  267 

marched  on  with  the  rest  of  the  army  against  the  Ethiopi- 
ans, though  he  wanted  all  manner  of  provisions  for  their  sub- 
sistence, till  at  length,  they  having  eaten  up  all  their  beasts 
of  burden,  they  came  to  feed  upon  each  other,  setting  out 
every  tenth  man  by  lot  for  this  purpose.  By  this  Cambyses 
being  convinced,  that  it  was  time  for  him  to  return,  marched 
back  his  army  to  Thebes,  after  having  lost  a  great  part  of  it 
in  this  wild  expedition  ;  and  from  thence  returned  to  Mem- 
phis. When  he  came  thither,  he  dismissed  all  the  Greeks 
to  their  respective  homes  ;  but,  on  his  entry  into  the  city, 
finding  it  all  in  mirth  and  jollity,  because  their  god  Apis  had 
then  appeared  among  them,  he  fell  into  a  great  rage,  suppo- 
sing all  this  rejoicing  to  have  been  for  the  ill  success  of  his 
affairs.  And,  when  he  called  the  magistrates,  and  they  gave 
him  a  true  account  of  the  matter,  he  would  not  believe  them, 
but  caused  them  to  be  put  to  death,  as  imposing  a  lieupon  him. 
And  then  he  sent  for  the  priests,  who  made  him  the  same  an- 
swer, telling  him  that  their  god,  having  manifested  himself 
unto  them,  (which  seldom  happened,)  it  was  always  their 
custom  to  celebrate  his  appearance  with  the  greatest  demon- 
strations of  joy  that  they  could  express.  To  this  he  replied, 
that  if  their  god  was  so  kind  and  familiar  as  to  appear  among 
then),  he  would  be  acquainted  with  him ;  and  therefore 
commanded  them  forthwith  to  bring  him  unto  him. 

The  chief  god  of  the  Egyptians  was  Osiris,^  him  they  wor- 
shipped in  the  shape  of  a  bull,  and  that  not  only  in  imagery, 
but  also  in  reality.  For  they  kept  a  bull  in  the  temple  of 
Osiris,  which  they  worshipped  in  his  stead.  At  Heliopolis 
he  was  called  Mnevis,  al  Memphis,  Apis.  The  marks  olJipis 
were  these.''  His  body  was  to  be  all  black,  excepting  a 
square  spot  of  white  on  his  forehead.  He  was  also  to 
have  the  figure  of  an  eagle,  say  some,  of  a  half  moon  say 
others,  on  his  back,  a  double  list  of  hair  on  his  tail,  and  a 
scarabaus  or  knot  under  his  tongue.  When  they  had  found 
such  an  one,  they  brought  him  with  great  rejoicing  to  the  tem- 
ple of  Osms,  and  there  kept  him,  and  worshipped  him  for  that 
god,  as  long  as  he  lived  ;  and  when  he  was  dead,  they  buried 
him  with  great  solemnity,  and  then  sought  for  another  with 
the  same  marks,  which  sometimes  it  was  many  years  ere  they 
could  find;  and  such  an  one  they  having  found,  on  Cam- 
byses's  return  to  Memphis  from  this  Ethiopic  expedition,  this 
was  the  reason  of  their  great  rejoicing  at  that  time.  And,  in 
imitation  of  this  idolatry  was  it,  that  Aaron  made  the  goWcn 
calf  in  the  wilderness,  and  Jeroboam  those  in  Dan  and 
Bethel,  and  did  set  them  up  there  to  be  worshipped  by  the 

g  Herodotus,  lib.  2.     Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  1. 

h  Herodotus,  lib  3      Din.  lib.  S.  c,  46      Soliniis,  c.  35.     Ammiaiius  Mar- 
cellinus.  c.  22. 


i?68  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  ['PART  J. 

children  of  Israel,  as  the  gods  that  had  brought  them  out  of 
the  land  of  Egypt. 

This  Apis  being  brought  to  Cambyses,  he  fell  into  a  rage, 
as  well  he  might,  at  the  sight  of  such  a  god,  and  drawing  out 
his  dagger,  run  it  into  the  thigh  of  the  beast ;  and  then,  re- 
proaching the  priests  for  their  stupidity  and  wretchedness  in 
worshipping  a  brute  for  a  god,  ordered  them  severely  to  be 
whipped,  and  all  the  Egyptians  in  Memphis  to  be  slain  that 
should  be  found  any  more  rejoicing  there  on  this  occasion. 
The  Jlpis  being  carried  back  to  the  temple,  there  languished 
of  his  wound,  and  died. 

The  Egyptians  say,  that,  after  this  act  (which  they  reckon 
to  have  been  the  highest  instance  of  impiety  that  was  ever 
found  among  them,)  Cambyses  was  stricken  with  madness. 
But  his  actions  showed  him  to  have  been  mad  long  before  ; 
of  which  he  continued  to  give  divers  instances.  They  tell 
us  of  these  following: 

He  had  a  brother,  tlic  only  son  of  Cyrus  besides  himself, 
and  born  of  the  same  mother  ;  his  name,  according  to  Xeno- 
phon,  was  Tanorxares,  but  Herodotus  calls  him  Smerdis,  and 
Justin,  Mergis.  He  accompanied  Cambyses  in  his  Egyptian 
expedition  ;  but  being  the  only  person  among  all  the  Per- 
sians that  could  draw  the  bow  which  Cambyses's  ambassa- 
dors brought  him  from  the  Ethiopian  king,  Cambyses  from 
hence  contracted  such  an  envy  against  him,  that  he  could  no 
longer  bear  him  in  the  army,  but  sent  him  back  into  Persia. 
And  not  long  after,  dreaming  that  one  came  and  told  him,  that 
Smerdis  sat  on  the  throne,  he  thereon  suspecting  of  his  bro- 
ther what  was  afterward  fultilled  by  another  of  his  name, 
sent  after  him,  into  Persia,  Prexaspes,  one  of  his  chiefest 
confidents,  with  orders  to  put  him  to  death ;  which  he  ac- 
cordingly executed.  And  when  one  of  his  sisters,  who  was 
with  him  in  the  camp,  on  tiic  hearing  of  it,  lamented  his 
death,  he  gave  her  such  a  blow  with  his  foot  in  the  belly, 
that  she  died  of  it.  She  was  tlic  youngest  of  his  sisters,  and 
being  a  very  beautiful  woman,  he  fell  violently  in  love  with 
her,  so  that  nothing  could  satisfy  him,  but  that  he  must  have 
her  to  wife;  whereon  he  called  together  all  the  royal  judges 
of  the  Persian  nation,  to  whom  the  interpretation  of  their 
laws  did  belong,  to  know  of  them  whether  they  had  any  law 
that  would  allow  it.  They  being  unwilling  to  authorize  any 
such  incestuous  marriage,  and  at  the  same  time  fearing  his 
violent  temper,  should  they  contradict  him  herein,  they 
gave  him  this  crafty  answer:  That  they  had  no  law  indeed 
that  permitted  a  brother  to  marry  his  sister;  but  they  had  a 
law  which  allowed  the  king  of  Persia  to  do  what  he  pleased  : 
which  serving  his  purpose  as  well  as  a  direet  approbation  of 


BOOK  III.}  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  269 

the  thing,  he  solemnly  married  her ;  and  hereby  gave  the 
first  example  to  that  incest  which  was  afterward  practised  by 
most  of  his  successors,  and  by  some  of  them  carried  so  far, 
as  to  marry  their  own  daughters.  This  lady  he  carried  with 
him  in  all  his  expeditions;  and  her  name  being  Meroe,  he 
from  her  gave  that  name  to  the  island  in  the  Nile  between 
Egypt  and  Ethiopia,  on  the  conquering  of  it.  which,  in  all 
our  maps  of  the  old  geography,  it  still  bears,'  (for  so  far  he 
advanced  in  his  wild  march  against  the  Ethiopians.)  And 
she  being  with  child  by  him  when  he  struck  her,  the  blow 
caused  an  abortion;  and  of  this  she  di^id.  And  so  vile  a 
marriage  deserved  no  better  end.  He  caused  also  several  of 
the  principal  of  his  followers  to  be  buried  alive,  without  any 
cause  deserving  of  it,  and  daily  sacrificed  some  or  other  of 
them  to  his  wild  fury.  And  when  Croesus  advised  iiim 
against  these  proceedings,  and  laid  before  him  the  ill  conse- 
quences which  they  would  lead  to,  he  ordered  him  to  be  put 
to  death.  And  when  those  who  received  his  orders,  know- 
ing he  would  repent  of  it  the  next  day,  did  therefore  defer 
the  execution,  he  caused  them  all  to  be  executed  for  it,  be- 
cause they  had  not  obeyed  his  commands;  although  at  the 
same  time  he  expressed  great  joy  that  Croesus  was  alive. 
And  out  of  a  mere  humour  only,  to  show  his  skill  in  archery, 
he  shot  to  death  a  son  of  Prexaspes,  who  was  the  chief  of 
his  favourites.  And  in  such  wild  actions  he  wore  out  the 
seventh  year  of  his  reign. 

In  the  beginning  of  the  eighth  year,  he  left  Egypt,  and  re- 
turned towards  Persia.  On  his  coming  into  Syria, 
he  there  met  with  an  herald,  who,  being  sent  from  c^nbyset^s! 
Shushan,  came  into  the  army,  and  there  proclaimed 
Smerdis,  the  son  of  Cyrus,  king,  and  commanded  all  men  to 
obey  him.  The  meaning  of  this  was,  Cambyses,  when  he  de- 
parted from  Shushan  on  the  Egyptian  expedition,  placed  there 
in  the  supreme  government  of  his  atfairs,  during  his  absence, 
Patizithes,  one  of  the  chief  of  the  Magians.  This  Pati- 
zithes  had  a  brother,  whu  did  very  much  resemble  Smer- 
dis the  son  of  Cyrus,  and  was  (for  that  reason  perchance) 
called  by  the  same  name.  As  soon  as  he  had  been  fully 
informed  of  the  death  of  that  prince  (which  had  been  con- 
cealed from  most  others)  and  found  that  the  extravagancies 
of  Cambyses  were  grown  to  an  height  no  longer  to  borne, 
he  placed  this  brother  of  his  on  the  throne,  giving  out  that 
he  was  the  true  Smerdis  the  son  of  Cyrus  ;  and  forthwith 
sent  out  heralds  into  all  parts  of  the  empire  to  give  notice 
hereof,  and  command  obedience  to     be    paid    unto     him. 

:-  Sfrabo,  lib.  7,  p.  790     Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  2.  c.  10. 


270  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PAIIT  I. 

Cambyses  having  seized  him  that  came  with  this  message  to 
the  army,  on  the  examining  of  him,  and  on  the  examining  of 
Prexaspes,  whom  he  had  sent  to  kill  his  brother,  found,  that 
the  true  Smerdis  was  certainly  dead,  and  that  this  was  none 
other  than  Smerdis  the  Magian,  who  had  invaded  the  throne; 
whereon,  much  lamenting  that  he  had  been  led  by  the  identi- 
ty of  the  name  to  murder  his  brother,  he  gave  orders  for  his 
army  forthwith  to  set  forward  to  suppress  the  usurper  ;  but 
as  he  mounted  his  horse  for  the  march,  his  sword  falling  out 
of  the  scabbard,  gave  him  a  wound  in  the  thigh,  of  which  he 
died  in  a  few  days  after.  The  Egyptians  remarking,  that  it 
was  in  the  same  part  of  the  body  where  he  had  afore  wounded 
the  Apis,  reckoned  it  as  an  especial  judgment  from  heaven 
upon  him  for  that  fact,  and  perchance  they  were  not  much  out 
in  it;  for  it  seldom  happened,  in  an  affront  given  to  any  par- 
ticular mode  of  worship,  how  erroneous  soever  it  may  be, 
but  that  religion  is  in  general  wounded  hereby.  There  are 
many  instances  in  history  wherein  God  hath  very  signally 
punished  the  profanations  of  religion  in  the  worst  of  times, 
and  under  the  worst  modes  of  heathen  idolatry.  While  he 
was  in  Egypt,  having  consulied  the  oracle  of  Butus  in  that 
country,  he  was  told  that  he  should  die  at  Ecbatana  ;  which 
xmderstanding  of  Ecbatana  in  Media,  he  resolved  to  preserve 
Iiis  life  by  never  going  thither.  But  what  he  thought  to 
avoid  in  Media,  he  found  in  Syria :  for  the  town  where  he 
lay  sick  of  this  wound,  was  of  the  same  name,  being  also 
called  Ecbatana  \^  of  which  when  he  was  informed,  taking 
it  for  certain  that  he  must  there  die,  ho  called  for  all  the 
chief  of  the  Persians  together,  and  acquainting  them  with 
the  true  state  of  the  case,  that  his  brother  was  certainly 
dead,  and  that  it  was  Smerdis  the  Magian  that  then  reigned, 
earnestly  exhorted  (hem  not  to  submit  to  the  cheat,  and  there- 
by permit  the  sovereignty  to  pass  from  the  Persians  again  to 
the  Modes,  of  which  nation  the  Magian  was ;  but  to  take  care 
to  set  up  a  king  over  them  of  their  own  people.  But  the 
Persians  thinking  all  this  was  said  by  him  out  of  hatred  to 
his  brother,  had  no  regard  to  it ;  but,  on  his  death,  quietly 

k  There  are  many  instances  of  such,  who,  on  their  over-cnriotis  inquiry 
into  their  future  fate,  have  been  in  the  same  manner  deceived.  Thus  Henry 
IV.  of  England,  being  foretold  that  be  should  die  at  Jerusalem,  was  sud- 
denly taken  sick  in  the  abbot  of  Westminster's  house,  and  died  there  in  Je- 
rusalem chamber.  And  so  Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  king  of  Spain,  being 
foretold  that  he  should  die  at  Madrigal,  carefully  avoided  going  thither. 
But  while  he  was  thus,  as  he  thought,  avoiding  his  death,  he  found  it  at 
Madrigalejo,  or  little  Madrigal,  a  poor  little  village  he  had  never  before 
heard  of.  For  as  he  was  accidentally  passing  through  it,  he  was  suddenly 
taken  ill ;  and,  being  carried  into  a  poor  cottage,  the  best  reception  the 
place  could  atford  him,  he  died  there,  in  a  hole  scarce  large  enough  to  re- 
ceive bis  bed. 


BOOK  lll.j  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  27  i 

submitted  to  him  whom  they  found  on  the  throne,  supposing 
him  to  be  the  true  Smerdis.  And  it  being  the  usage  of  the 
eastern  kings  in  those  times,  to  live  retired  in  their  palaces, 
and  there  transact  all  their  alTiiirs  by  the  intercourse  of  their 
eunuchs,  without  admitting  any  else,  unless  those  of  their 
highest  confidents,  to  have  access  to  them,  the  Magian  exact- 
ly observed  this  conduct:  and  therefore  being  never  seen  in 
public,  this  made  it  the  harder  for  them  to  discover  the 
cheat. 

Cambyses  reigned  seven  years  and  five  months  :'  the  re- 
maining seven  months  of  the  eighth  year  was  the  reign  of 
the  Magian.  F^erodotus  calls  him  Smerdis.  (as  hath  been  al- 
ready said,)  iEschylus,  Mardus,  Ctesias,  Spendadates,  and  Jus- 
tin, Orapastes,  but  in  the  Scripture  he  is  called  Artaxerxes."* 
As  soon  as  he  was  settled  in  the  kingdom,  after  the  death  of 
Cambyses,  the  Samaritans  wrote  a  letter  to  him,  setting 
forth,  that  the  Jews  were  rebuilding  their  city  and  temple  at 
Jerusalem  ;  that  they  having  been  always  a  rebellious  peo- 
ple there  was  reason  to  suspect,  that  as  soon  as  they  should 
have  finished  that  work,  Ihey  should  withdraw  their  obedi- 
ence from  the  king,  and  pay  no  more  toll  nor  tribute  ;  which 
might  give  an  occasion  for  all  Syria  and  Palestine  to  revolt 
also,  and  the  king  be  excluded  from  having  any  more  por- 
tion on  that  side  of  the  river  Euphrates.  And,  for  the  truth 
of  what  they  had  informed  him  of,  as  to  the  rebellious  tem- 
per of  that  people,  they  referred  him  to  the  records  of  his 
predecessors,  wherein  they  desired  search  might  be  made 
concerning  this  matter."  On  the  receipt  of  this  letter,  ex- 
amination being  made  according  to  the  purport  of  it,  into 
the  records  of  former  times  concerning  the  behaviour  of  the 
Jews  under  the  Assyrian  and  Babylonish  empires  ;  and  i<: 
being  found  in  them  with  what  valour  they  had  long  defend- 
ed themselves,  and  with  what  difficulty  they  were  at  length 
reduced  by  Nebuchadnezzar,  an  order  was  issued  forth  to 
prohibit  them  from  proceeding  any  further,  and  sent  to  the 
Samaritans  to  see  it  put  into  execution  ;  who  immediately, 
on  the  receipt  hereof,  went  up  to  Jerusalem,  and  having  ex- 
hibited their  order  to  the  Jews,  made  them  desist  by  force 
and  power  from  going  on  any  farther  with  the  work  of  the 
house  ;  so  it  wholly  ceased  till  the  second  year  of  Darius  king 
of  Persia,  for  about  the  space  of  two  years.  The  king  that 
now  reigned  having  been  a  chief  leader  of  the  sect  of  the 
Magians,  against  whom  the  Jews  were  in  the  utmost  oppo- 
sition in  point  of  religion,  the  aversion  he  had  to  them  on  this 
account,  no  doubt,  furthered  this  decree  against  them. 

1  Herododis.  lib.  t^.  m  Ezra  iv.  7.  n  Ezra  iv.  7 — 24, 


272  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OF  fpART  f^ 

That  Cambyses  was  the  Ahasuerus,  and  Smerdis  the  Ar 
taxerxes,  that  obstructed  the  work  of  the  temple,  is  plain 
from  hence,  that  they  are  said  in  Scripture"  to  be  tho  kings 
of  Persia,  that  reigned  between  the  time  of  Cyrus,  and  the 
time  of  that  Darius  by  whose  decree  the  temple  was  finished; 
but  that  Darius  being  Darius  Hystaspes  (as  will  be  unanswer- 
ably demonstrated  in  its  proper  place,)  and  none  reigning 
between  Cyrus  and  that  Darius  in  Persia,  but  Cambyses  and 
Smerdis,  it  must  follow  from  hence,  that  none  but  Cam- 
byses and  Smerdis  could  be  the  Ahasuerus  and  Artaxerxes 
who  are  said  in  Ezra  to  have  put  a  stop  to  this  work. 

But  though  Smerdis  was  thus  unkind  to  the  Jews,''  ho 
studied  to  show  grace  and  favour  to  all  others,  that  so  gaining 
their  affections,  he  might  the  better  secure  himself  in  the 
possession  of  the  throne  which  he  had  usurped.  And  there- 
fore, as  soon  as  he  had  taken  on  him  the  sovereignty,  he  grant- 
ed to  all  his  subjects  a  freedom  from  taxes,  and  an  immunity 
from  all  military  services  for  three  years;  and  also  did  so 
many  other  things  for  their  benefit,  as  made  his  death  to  be 
very  much  lamented  by  a  great  many  of  them  on  the  change 
that  after  followed.  And  farther,  to  secure  himself,  he  took 
to  wife  Atossa  the  daughter  of  Cyrus,  aiming  thereby  to  hold 
the  empire  by  her  title,  if  in  case  of  a  discovery  he  could 
not  be  allowed  to  have  any  of  his  own.  She  had  before 
been  the  wife  of  Cambyses :  for,  after  he  had,  upon  the  de- 
cision above  mentioned,  married  one  of  his  sisters,  he  took 
this  other  to  wife  also.  And  the  Magian,  while  he  pretend- 
ed to  be  her  brother,  married  her  on  the  same  footing. 

But  these  steps  which  he  took  for  his  security,  made  it  the 
more  suspected  that  he  was  not  the  true  Smerdis ;  for  if  he 
were,  there  would  have  been  no  need  (it  was  said)  of  using 
all  these  arts  and  precautions  for  his  establishment  in  the 
empire.  And  the  care  which  he  took  never  to  be  seen  in 
public  augmented  the  suspicion.  To  be  fully  satisfied  in 
this  matter,  Otanes,  a  noble  Persian,  brother  of  Cassandana 
(who  is  said  by  Herodotus  to  have  been  mother  to  Cambyses, 
and  the  true  Smerdis's  brother)  having  a  daughter  named 
Phedyma,  that  had  been  one  of  Cambyses's  wives,  and  was 
now  kept  by  the  Magian  in  the  same  quality,  sent  to  her 
to  know,  whether  it  were  Smerdis  the  son  of  Cyrus  that  she 
lay  with,  or  else  some  other  man.  The  answer  which  she 
returned  was.  that  she  having  never  seen  Smerdis  the 
son  of  Cyrus,  she  could  not  tell.  He  then  by  a  second 
message,  bid  her  inquire  of  Atossa  (who  could  not  but 
know  her  own  brother)  whether  this  were  he  or  no  ?  where- 
on she  having  informed  him,  that  the  present  king  kept  all 

o  Ezra  iv.  5 — 7  p  Heropotus,  lib.  3 


iiOOK  HI.]  XHK  OLD  A.VD  NKW    TESTAMBKTSi  2'J'3 

his  wives  apart,  so  that  they  never  conversed  with  each 
other,  and  that  therefore  she  could  not  come  at  Atossa  to 
ask  this  question  of  her  ;  he  sent  her  a  third  message,  where- 
by he  directed  her  that,  when  he  should  next  lie  with  her, 
she  should  take  the  opportunity,  while  he  slept,  to  feel  whe^ 
ther  he  had  any  ears  or  not :  for  Cyrus  having  caused  the  ears 
of  Smerdis  the  Magian  to  be  cut  otT  for  some  crime  that 
deserved  it,  he  told  her,  that  if  the  person  she  lay  with  had 
ears,  she  might  satisfy  herself,  that  he  was  Smerdis  the  son  of 
Cyrus  ;  but  that  if  she  found  it  was  otherwise,  he  was  cer- 
tainly Smerdis  the  Magian,  and  therefore  unworthy  of  pos- 
sessing either  the  crown  or  her.  Phedyma,  having  received 
these  instructions,  took  the  next  opportunity  of  making  the 
trial  she  was  directed  to  ;  and  finding  hereon,  that  the  person 
she  lay  with  had  no  ears,  she  sent  word  to  her  father  of 
it,  and  hereby  the  whole  fraud  became  detected.  Where- 
on Otanes,  taking  to  him  six  other  of  the  nobility  of  the  Per- 
sians, entered  into  the  palace,  and  there  falling  on  the  usur= 
per,  and  his  brother  Patizithes,  who  had  been  the  contriver 
of  the  whole  plot,  slew  them  both ;  and  then  bringing  out 
their  heads  to  the  people,  declared  unto  them  the  whole 
imposture ;  which  did  set  them  into  such  a  rage,  that  they 
fell  on  the  whole  sect  which  the  impostor  was  of,  and 
slew  all  of  them  that  they  met  with  that  day.  For  which 
reason  the  said  day  on  which  this  was  done,  thenceforth  be- 
came an  annual  festival  among  them  ;  and,  for  a  long  while 
after,  it  was  celebrated  every  year  by  the  Persians  in  com- 
memoration of  the  discovery  of  this  imposture,  and  their 
deliverance  from  it.  And  by  reason  of  the  great  slaughter  of 
the  Magians  then  made,  it  was  called  Magofonia,  or  the  slaugh- 
ter-day of  theMagians.  And  it  wasfrom  this  time  that  they  first 
had  the  name  of  Magians  ;  which  signifying  the  Cropt-ear^d, 
it  was  then  given  unto  them  by  way  of  nickname  and  con- 
tempt, because  of  this  impostor,  who  was  thus  cropped.  For 
mige-gush  signified,  in  llie  language  of  the  country  then  ia 
use,  one  that  had  his  ears  cropped  ;  and,  from  a  ringleader  o£ 
that  sect  who  was  thus  cropped,  the  author  of  the  famous 
Arabic  lexicon,  called  Camus,  tells  us,  they  had  all  this  name 
given  unto  them.'^  And  what  Herodotus,  and  Justin,  and 
other  authors,  write  of  this  Smerdis,  plainly  shows,  that  he 
was  the  man.  After  this  the  whole  sect  of  the  Magians  grew 
into  that  contempt,  that  they  would  have  sunk  into  an  utter 
extinction,  but  that  a  few  years  after,  it  was,  under  the  name 
of  a  reformation,  again  revived  by  Zoroastres  ;  of  which  an 
account  will  be  hereafter  given  in  its  proper  place. 

In  the  interim,  it  may  be  proper  to  acquaint  the  reader, 

q  Pocockil  Specimen  Historise  Aiabicffij  p.  H^. 
Vol,  I.  35 


274  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  Oi'  [I'ART  I- 

all  the  idolatry  of  the  world  was  divided  between  two  sects, 
that  is,  the  worshippers  of  images,  who  were  called  the  Sa- 
bians,  and  the  worshippers  of  fire,  who  were  called  the  Ma- 
gians/     The  true  religion,  which  Noah  taught  his  posterity, 
was  that  which   Abraham  practised,  the  worshipping  of  one 
God,  the  supreme  Governor  and  Creator  of  all  things,  with 
hopes  in  his  mercy  through  a  Mediator:  for  the  necessity  of 
a  Mediator  between  God   and   man  was  a  general   notion, 
which  obtained  among  all  mankind  from  the  beginning;  for 
being  conscious  of  their  own  meanness,  vileness,  and  impu- 
rity, they  could  not  conceive  how  it  was  possible  for  them, 
of  themselves  alone,  to  have  any  access  to  the  all-holy,  all- 
glorious,  and  supreme  Governor  of  all  things.     They  consi- 
dered him  as  too  high,  and  too  pure,  and  themselves  too  low 
and  polluted,  for  such  a  converse  ;  and  therefore  concluded, 
that  there  must  be  a  mediator,  by  whose  means  only  they 
eould  make  any  address  unto  him,  and  by  whose  intercession 
alone  any  of  their  petitions  could  be  accepted  of.     But  no 
clear  revelation  being  then  made  of  the  Mediator  whom  God 
had  appointed,  because  as  yet  he  had  not  been  manifested 
unto  the  world,  they  took  upon  them  to  address  unto  him  by 
mediators  of  their  own  choosing.     And  their  notion  of  the 
sun,  moon,  and  stars,   being,  that  they  were  the  tabernacles 
or  habitations  of  intelligences,  which  animated  those  orbs  in 
the  same  manner  as  the  soul  of  man  animates  his  body,  and 
were  the  causes  of  all  their  motions ;  and  that  these  intelli- 
gences were  of  a  middle  nature  between  God  and  them,  they 
thought  these  the  fittest  beings  to  become  the  mediators  be- 
tween God  and  them.     And  therefore  the  planets  being  the 
nearest  to  them  of  all  these  heavenly  bodies,  and  generally 
looked  on  to  have  the  greatest  influence  on  this  world,  they 
made  choice  of  them  in  the  first  place  for  their  gods-media- 
tors, who  were  to  mediate  for  them  with  the  supreme  God, 
and  procure  from  him  the  mercies  and  favours  which  they 
prayed  for ;  and   accordingly  they  directed  divine  worship 
unto  them  as   such.     And   here  began   all   the   idolatry  that 
hath  been  practised    in  the  world.     They  first  worshipped 
them  per  sacella,  that  is,  by  their  tabernacles,  and  afterward 
by  images  also.     By  these  sacel/a,  or  tabernacles,  they  meant 
the  orbs  themselves,  which  they  looked  on  only  as  the  sacella 
or  sacred  tabernacles,  in  which  the  intelligences  had  their  ha- 
bitations.    And  therefore  when  they  paid  their  devotions  to 
any  one  of  them,  they  directed  their  worship  towards  the 

r  Vide  Pocockii  Specimen  Historiae  Arabica;,  p.  13S.  Golii  Notas  ad  Al~ 
fraganiim,  p.  251.  Maimonidem  in  Moreh  Nevochim.  Hotingeri  Histoii- 
am  Orientalem,  lih.  4,  c.  S.  HisToriam  rnligionis  vetfTum  Per.«ariim  per 
Xhomam  Hvcfe 


1300K  III.j  THE  OLD  ANJJ  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  ^75 

planet  in  which  they  supposed  he  dwelt.  But  these  orbs,  by 
their  rising  and  setting,  being  as  much  under  the  horizon  as 
above,  they  were  at  a  loss  how  to  address  to  them  in  their 
absence.  To  remedy  this,  they  had  recourse  to  the  inven- 
tion of  images  ;  in  which,  after  their  consecration,  they 
thought  these  intelligences,  or  inferior  deities,  to  be  as  much 
present  by  their  influence,  as  in  the  planets  themselves ;  and 
that  all  addresses  to  them  were  made  as  effectually  before 
the  one,  as  before  the  other.  And  this  was  the  beginning  of 
image-worship  among  them.  To  these  images  were  given 
the  names  of  the  planets  they  represented,  which  were  the 
same  they  are  still  called  by.  And  hence  it  is,  that  we  find 
Saturn,  Jupiter,  Mars,  Apollo,  Mercury,  Venus,  and  Diana, 
to  be  first  ranked  in  the  polytheism  of  the  ancients  ;  for  they 
were  their  first  gods.  After  this  a  notion  obtaining,  that  good 
men  departed  had  a  power  with  God  also  to  mediate  and  in- 
tercede for  them,  they  deified  many  of  those  whom  they 
thought  to  be  such;  and  hence  the  number  of  their  gods  in- 
creased in  the  idolatrous  times  of  the  world.  This  religion 
first  began  among  the  Chaldeans;  which  their  knowledge  in 
astronomy  helped  to  lead  them  to.  And  from  this  it  was, 
that  Abraham  separated  himself  when  he  cam.e  out  of  Chal- 
dea.  From  the  Chaldeans  it  spread  itself  over  ail  the  East, 
where  the  professors  of  it  had  the  name  of  Sabians.  From 
them  it  passed  into  Egypt,  and  from  thence  to  the  Grecians, 
who  propagated  it  to  all  the  western  nations  of  (he  world. 
And  therefore,  those  who  mislike  the  notion  advanced  by 
Maimonides,^  that  many  of  the  Jewish  laws  were  made  in 
opposition  to  the  idolatrous  rites  of  the  Sabians,  are  much 
mistaken,  when  they  object  against  it,  that  the  Sabians  were 
an  inconsiderable  sect,  and  therefore  not  likely  to  have  been 
so  far  regarded  in  that  matter.  They  are  now  indeed,  since 
the  growth  of  Christianity  and  Mahometanism  in  the  world, 
reduced  to  an  inconsiderable  sect ;  but  anciently  they  were 
all  the  nations  of  the  world  that  worshipped  God  by  images. 
And  that  Maimonides  understood  the  name  in  this  latitude, 
is  plain  from  hence,  that  he  tells  us,  the  Sabians,  whom  he 
spoke  of,  were  a  sect  whose  heresy  had  overspread  almost 
all  mankind.*  The  remainder  of  this  sect  still  subsists  in  the 
East,  under  the  same  name  of  Sabians,  which  they  pretend 
to  have  received  from  Sabius,  a  son  of  Seth.  And  among 
the  books  wherein  the  doctrines  of  their  sect  are  contained, 
they  have  one,  which  they  call  the  book  of  Seth,  and  say, 
that  it  was  written  by  that  patriarch.  That  which  hath  given 
them  the  greatest  credit  among  the  people  of  the  East  is, 
that  the  best  of  their  astronomers  have  been  of  this  sect,  as 

s  In  Moreh  Nevochhu.  t  Moreh  >'evochim,part  1.  c.  63. 


$76  CONNEXION  OF  THLT  HISTORY  OF  j  TAUT  J. 

Thebet  Ebn  Korrah,  Albaltani,  and  others  ;  for  the  stars 
being  the  gods  they  worshipped,  they  made  them  the  chiei 
subject  of  their  studies.  These  Sabians,  in  the  consecrating 
of  their  images,  used  many  incantations,  to  draw  down  into 
them  from  the  stars  those  intelligences  for  whom  they  erected 
them,  whose  power  and  influence  they  held  did  afterward 
dwell  in  them.  And  from  hence  the  whole  foolery  of  te- 
lesms,  which  some  make  so  much  ado  about,  had  its  original. 
Directly  opposite  to  these  were  the  Magians,  another  sect, 
who  had  their  original  in  the  same  eastern  countries  ;  for  they, 
abominating  all  images,  worshipped  God  only  by  fire."  They 
began  first  in  Persia,  and  there,  and  in  Ifjdia,  were  the  only 
places  where  this  sect  was  propagated  ;  and  there  they  re- 
nnain  even  to  this  day.  Their  chief  doctrine  was,  that  there 
were  two  principles,^  one  which  was  the  cause  of  all  good, 
and  the  other  the  cause  of  all  evil,  that  is  to  say,  God  and 
the  devil ;  that  the  fornier  is  represented  by  light,  and  the 
other  by  darkness,  as  their  truest  symbols  ;  and  that,  of  the 
composition  of  these  two,  all  things  in  the  world  are  made; 
the  good  god  they  name  Yazdan,  and  also  Ormuzd,  and  the 
evil  god,  Ahraman  :  the  former  is  by  the  Greeks  called 
Oramasdes,  and  the  latter  Arimanius.  And  therefore,  when 
Xerxes  prayed  for  that  evil  upon  his  enemies,  that  it  might 
be  put  into  the  minds  of  all  of  them  to  drive  their  best  and 
bravest  men  from  them,  as  the  Athenians  had  Themistocles,^ 
he  addressed  his  prayer  to  Arimanius,  the  evil  god  of  the 
Persians,  and  not  to  Oramasdes,  their  good  good.  And  con- 
cerning these  two  gods  there  was  this  difference  of  opinion 
among  them,  that  whereas  some  held  both  of  them  to  have 
been  from  all  eternity,  there  were  others  that  contended,  that 
the  good  god  only  was  eternal,  and  that  the  other  was  created. 
But  they  both  agreed  in  this,  that  there  will  be  a  continual 
opposition  betweeii  these  two  (ill  the  end  of  the  world;  that 
then  the  good  god  shall  overcome  the  evil  god,  and  that  from 
thenceforward  each  of  them  shall  have  his  world  to  himself, 
that  is,  the  good  god  his  world  with  all  good  men  with  him, 
and  the  evil  god  his  world  wi(h  all  evil  men  with  him  ;  that 
darkness  is  (he  truest  symbol  of  the  evil  god,  and  light  the 
truest  symbol  of  (he  good  god.  And  therefore  they  always 
worshipped  him  before  fire,  as  being  (he  cause  of  light,  and 
especially  before  the  sun,   as  being  in  their  opinion  the  per- 

u  Vide  I'ocockii  Specimen  Historia;  Arabic.T,  p.  146,  147,  &c.  et  Histori 
am  religionis  vetcriim  Persarum  fier  Tliomam  Hyde. 

X  This  ojiinioii  iM.tiies,  the  heretic,  received  from  them,  and  would  have 
introduceci  it  into  the  Christian  religion,  it  being  the  principal  point  which 
those  of  his  heresy,  called  from  him  Miuiii.Iices,  endeavoured  to  impose  oi\ 
the  world. 

V  Plutarshiis  in  Themislocle 


iJOOK  III.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  277 

fectest  fire,  and  causing  the  perfectest  light.  And  for  this  reason, 
in  all  their  temples,  they  had  tire  continually  burning  on  altars, 
erected  in  thenri  for  that  purpose.  And  before  these  sacred 
fires  they  offered  up  all  their  public  devotions,  as  likewise  they 
did  all  their  private  devotions  before  their  private  tires  in  their 
own  houses.  Thus  did  they  ^^p.y  the  highest  honour  to  light,  to 
as  being  in  their  opinion  the  truest  representative  of  the  good 
god;  but  always  hated  darkness, as  being,  what  they  thought, 
the  truest  representative  of  the  evil  god,  whom  they  ever  had 
in  the  utmost  detestation,  as  we  now  have  the  devil :  and, 
for  an  instance  hereof,  whenever  they  had  an  occasion  in 
any  of  their  writings  to  mention  his  name,  they  always  wrote 
it  backward,  and  inversed,  as  thus,  uemujiiv.  And  these 
were  the  tenets  of  this  sect,  when,  on  the  death  of  Camby- 
ses,  Smerdis  and  Patizithes,  the  two  chiefest  ringleaders  of 
it,  made  that  attempt  for  the  usurping  of  the  sovereignty 
which  I  have  mentioned. 

The  seven  princes,  who  had  slain  these  usurpers,  entering 
into  consultation  among  themselves  about  the  set- 
tling of  the  government,  on  the  sixth  day  after,  came  ^ariu?i! 
to  this  agreement  :^  That  the  monarchy  should  be  con- 
tinued in  the  same  manner  as  it  had  been  established  by  Cy- 
rus; and  that,  for  the  determining  which  of  them  should  be  the 
monarch,  they  should  meet  on  horseback  the  next  morning 
against  the  rising  of  the  sun,  at  a  place  in  the  suburbs  of  the 
city,  which  they  had  appointed  for  it,  and  that  he  whose 
liorse  should  first  neigh,  should  be  the  king  ;  for  the  sun  being 
then  the  great  deity  of  the  Persians,  and  equally  adored  by 
them  all,  whether  of  the  Sabian  or  Magian  sect,  by  this  me- 
thod they  seemed  to  refer  the  election  to  it.  But  the  groom 
of  Darius,  one  of  the  seven  princes,  being  informed  of  what 
was  agreed  on,  made  use  of  a  device  which  secured  the 
crown  to  his  master ;  for  the  night  before,  having  tied  a  mare 
to  the  place  where  they  were  the  next  morning  to  meet,  he 
brought  Darius's  horse  thither,  and  put  him  to  cover  the 
mare  ;  and,  therefore,  as  soon  as  the  princes  came  thither  at 
the  time  appointed,  Darius's  horse,  at  the  sight  of  the  place, 
remembering  the  mare,  ran  thither  and  neighed  ;  whereon 
he  was  forthwith  saluted  king  by  the  rest,  and  accordingly 
placed  on  the  throne.  He  was  the  son  of  Hystaspes,  a  noble 
Persian  of  the  royal  family  of  Achasmenes,  who  had  followed 
Cyrus  in  all  his  wars.  He  was  at  that  time  governor  of  the 
province  of  Persia,  and  so  continued  for  many  years  after 
his  son's  advancement  to  the  throne.  This  Darius,  in  the 
•writings  of  the  latter  Persians,  is  called  Gushtasph,  and  his 

7.  Herodotus,  lib,  3.    .lustin,  lib.  1.  c.  10. 


278  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  Of  [I'ART  I. 

father  Lorasph  ;    and,    under  these  names,   they  are  much 
spoken  of  in  that  country  even  to  this  day. 

The  empire  of  Persia  being  thus  restored,  and  settled  by 
the  wisdom  and  valour  of  these  seven  princes,  they  were  af- 
terward admitted  to  extraordinary  honours  and  privileges 
under  the  new  king  ;  for  they  were  to  have  access  to  his  pre- 
sence at  all  times,  whenever  they  should  desire,  unless  only 
when  he  was  accompanying  with  any  of  his  wives,  and  their 
advice  was  to  be  tirst  had  in  the  management  of  all  the  pub- 
lic affairs  of  the  empire.  And  whereas  the  king  only  wore 
his  turbant  directly  upright,  and  all  others  till  then  with  his 
top  reversed  or  turned  backward,  these  had  it  by  way  of  spe- 
cial privilege  granted  unto  them  from  thenceforth,  to  wear 
their  turbants  with  the  top  turned  forward.  For  they  having, 
when  they  went  in  to  fall  upon  the  Magians,  turned  the  back 
part  of  their  turbants  forward,  that  they  might  by  that  signal 
be  the  better  known  to  each  other  in  the  scutfie,  in  memory  of 
this,  as  an  especial  mark  of  honour,  they  were  permitted  to 
wear  their  turbants  in  that  manner  ever  afterward.  And 
from  this  time  the  Persian  kings  of  this  race  had  always  seven 
chief  counsellors  in  the  same  maimer  privileged,  who  were 
their  prime  assistants  in  the  government,  and  by  whose  ad- 
vice all  the  public  affairs  of  the  empire  were  transacted  ;  and 
under  this  character  we  find  them,  both  in  the  book  of  Ezra^ 
and  in  the  book  of  Esther,''  made  mention  of. 

As  soon  as  Darius  was  settled  in  the  throne,*^  to  establish 
him  the  firmer  in  it,  he  took  to  wife  Atossa,  the  daughter  of 
Cyrus,  and  also  another  daughter  of  his,  called  Artistona. 
The  former  had  been  before  wife  to  Cambyses,  her  brother, 
and  afterward  to  Smerdis  the  Magian,  while  he  usurped  the 
throne.  But  Artistona  was  a  virgin  when  he  married  her, 
and  was  the  most  beloved  by  him  of  all  his  wives.  Besides 
these,  he  took  also  to  wife  Parmys,  the  daughter  of  the  true 
Smerdis,  brother  of  Cambyses,  and  Phedyma,  the  daughter 
of  Otanes,  by  whose  mean  the  imposture  of  the  Magian  was 
discovered,  and  by  these  had  a  great  many  children,  both 
sons  and  daughters. 

Although,  by  the  death  of  the  usurper,  his  edict  which 
prohibited  the  building  of  the  temple  was  now  at  an  end, 
yet,  the  Jews  neglecting  to  resume  the  work,  God  did  for 
this  reason  smite  the  land  with  barrenness,  so  that  both  the 
vintage  and  the  harvest  failed  them.''  But  in  the 
ijariu?2.'  second  year  of  Darius,  they  being  by  the  prophet 
Haggai  informed  of  the  cause  of  this  judgment  upon 
them,  and  exhorted  to  the  doing  of  their  duty  for  the  averting 

a  Chap.  vii.  14.  b  Chap.  i.  14. 

<;  Herodotus,  lib.  3.  d  Haggai  i.  6—11 ;  ii.  17, 19 


BOOK  III,]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  279 

of  it,  they  betook  themselves  again  to  prepare  for  the  car- 
rying on  of  the  work.  It  was  on  the  first  day  of  the  sixth 
month*'  (which  answers  to  about  the  middle  of  our  August,) 
that  the  word  of  the  Lord,  by  Haggai  the  prophet,  came  to 
Zerubbabel,  the  son  of  Salathiel,  governor  of  Judea,  and  to 
Jeshua,  the  son  of  Jozadak,  the  high-priest,  concerning  this 
matter.  And,  on  the  twenty-fourth  day  of  the  same  month,*^ 
they  being  excited  hereby,  arose  with  all  the  remnant  of  the 
people,  and  obe}ed  the  voice  of  the  Lord,  and  again  applied 
themselves  with  all  diligence  to  provide  stone  and  timber, 
and  all  other  materials  that  were  necessary  for  the  again  car- 
rying on  of  the  work.  And,  to  encourage  them  to  go  on 
vigorously  herewith,  on  the  twenty-first  day  of  the  seventh 
month,  (i.  e.  about  the  beginning  of  our  October,)  another 
message  from  God  came  to  them  by  the  same  prophet,s 
which  not  only  assured  them  of  his  presence  with  them 
herein,  to  make  it  prosper  in  their  hands  ;  but  also  promised 
them,  that  the  glory  of  the  latter  house,  when  built,  should 
be  greater  than  the  glory  of  the  former  house  j*^  which  was 
accordingly  accomplished,  when  Christ  our  Lord  came  to 
this  his  temple,  and  honoured  it  with  his  presence.  In  all 
other  respects  this  latter  temple,  the  same  prophet  tells  us, 
at  its  first  building,  was  as  nothing  in  comparison  of  the 
former.' 

In  the  eighth  month  of  the  same  year,''  (which  answers  to 
part  of  our  October  and  part  of  November,)  the  word 
of  the  Lord  came  by  Zechariah  the  prophet  to  the  people  of 
the  Jews,  exhorting  them  to  repentance,  and  promising  them 
mercy  and  favour  on  their  obedience  hereto. 

On  the  twenty-fourth  day  of  the  ninth  month,'  (which  fell 
about  the  beginning  of  our  December,)  the  Jews,  after  they 
had  been  employed  from  the  twenty-fourth  day  of  the  sixth 
month  in  preparing  materials  for  the  temple,  went  on  again 
•with  the  building  of  it;™  whereon  the  prophet  Haggai  pro- 
mised them  from  God  a  deliverance  from  that  barrenness  of 
their  land,  with  which  it  had  been  smitten,  and  plentiful  in- 
crease of  all  its  fruits  for  the  future;"  and  also  delivered 
unto  Zerubbabel  a  message  from  God  of  mercy  and  favour 
unto  him. 

Iti  the  beginning  of  the   next  year  (which  was  the  third 

e  Haggai  i.  1.  f  Haggai  i.  15. 

g  Haggai  ii.  1.  h  Haggai  i.  9. 

i  Haggai  ii.  3.  k  Zecli.  i.  1. 

1  Haggai  ii.  18.  m  Haggai  ii.  10 — 19. 

n  Haggai  ii.  20—23- 


iiiJO  COMNEXlON  Ui'  THE  HISTORV  Oi  [PART  <<■ 

}ear  of  Darius  according  to  the  Babylonian  and  Per- 
i)arius^3.    ^''^^  accouut,  but  the  second  according  to  the  Jewish,)" 

the  Samaritans,  understanding  that  the  building  of 
the  temple  went  on  again,  notwithstanding  the  stop  which 
they  had  procured  to  be  put  to  it  in  the  last  reign,  they  be- 
took themselves  again  to  their  old  malicious  practices  for 
the  obstructing  of  the  work;P  and  therefore  applied  them- 
selves to  Tatnai,  whom  Darius  had  made  chief  governor,  or 
prefect  of  all  the  provinces  of  Syria  and  Pale?iinc,  (which 
■was  one  of  the  twenty  prefectures  into  which  he  had  lately 
divided  his  whole  empire, )'^  and  made  complaint  to  him 
against  the  Jews  as  to  this  matter,  suggesting,  that  they  pro- 
ceeded herein  without  authority,  and  that  it  would  tend  to 
the  prejudice  of  the  king;  whereon  Tatnai,  being  accompa- 
nied by  Shetharboznai  (who  seems  to  have  been  then  gover- 
nor of  Samaria,)  came  to  Jerusalem  to  take  an  account  of 
what  was  there  doing.  But  Tatnai,  being  a  man  of  temper 
and  justice,  after  he  had  made  a  view  of  the  building,  did 
not  proceed  roughly  and  rashly  to  put  a  stop  to  it,  but  first 
inquired  of  the  elders  of  the  Jews  by  what  authority  they 
had  gone  on  with  it.  And  they  having  produced  to  him 
Cyrus's  decree,  he  would  not  take  upon  him  to  contradict 
the  same,  or  order  any  thing  contrary  to  it  upon  his  own 
authority ;  but  first  wrote  letters  to  the  king,  to  know  his 
pleasure  concerning  it ;  wherein  he  fairly  stated  the  case, 
setting  forth  the  matter  of  fact,  and  also  the  Jews'  plea  of 
Cyrus's  decree,  for  the  Justifying  of  themselves  herein  ;  and 
thereon  requested  that  search  might  be  made  among  the 
records  of  the  kingdom,  whether  there  were  any  such  decree 
granted  by  Cyrus,  or  no,  and  that  thereon,  the  king  would 
be  pleased  to  signify  unto  him,  what  he  would  have  done 
herein.  Whereon  search  being  made,  and  the  decree  being 
found  among  the  rolls  in  the  royal  palace  at  Ecbatana  in 
Media,  where  Cyrus  was  when  he  granted  it,  the  king  resol- 
ved to  confirm  the  same  'J  for  having  lately  married  two  of 
the  daughters  of  Cyrus,  the  better  to  fortify  his  title  to  the 
crown  thereby,  he  thought  it  concerned  him  to  do  every 
thing  that  might  tend  to  support  the  honour  and  veneration 
which   was  due   to  the   memory  of  that  great  prince ;    and 

p  For  the  Babylonians  and  Persians,  at  this  time  began  their  year  from  the 
beginning  of  January;  l)ut  the  Jews  from  Nisan,  about  tea  or  eleven  weeks 
after.  And  therefore,  seeing  the  eighth  month  (which  answers  in  part  to  our 
Ortober,)  was  according  to  Zechariah  (i.  1.)  in  the  second  year  of  Darius, 
whatsoever  was  acted  from  the  beginning  of  January,  within  a  year  after, 
iinst  be  in  the  third  year  of  Darius  according  to  the  Babylonish  account, 
aid  also  according  to  the  exact  truth  of  the  matter;  for  Durius  began  his 
reign  with  the  beginning  of  the  Babylonish  year. 

p  Ezra  V.  3—17,  q  Herodotusj  lib.  3.  r  Ezrav? 


BOOli  Ill.j  Tii.E  OLD  A.\I)   :\EW  TES.XAAIEXTS*  2iil 

therefore  would  suffer  nothing  to  be  infringed  of  that,  which 
he  had  so  solemnly  granted,  but  ordered  his  royal  decree  to 
be  drawn  ;  wherein  recitement  being  made  of  the  decree  of 
Cyrus,  he  commanded  it  in  every  particular  to  be  observed, 
and  sent  it  to  Tatnai  and  Shetharboznai,  to  see  it  fully  and  ef- 
fectually put  in  execution,  decreeing,  that  whosoever  should 
alter  the  same,  or  put  any  obstruction  to  it,  should  have  his 
house  pulled  down,  and  that  a  gallows  being  made  of  the 
limber  of  it,  he  should  be  hanged  thereon. 

On  the  twenty-fourth  day  of  the  eleventh  month,^  (that  is, 
about  the  beginning  of  our  F'ebruary,)  the  prophet  Zechariah 
had,  in  a  vision,  that  revelation  made  unto  him  which  is  con- 
tained in  the  book  of  his  prophecies,  from  the  seventh  verse 
of  the  first  chapter  to  the  ninth  verse  of  the  sixth  chapter. 
The  substance  of  which  is  to  express  the  mercy  that  God 
would  show  unto  his  people,  in  the  restoration  and  redemp- 
tion of  Sion,  and  the  vengeance  which  he  would  execute  upon 
those  that  had  oppressed  them. 

About  the  beginning  of  the  fourth  year  of  Darius,  his  de-< 
cree  which  confirmed  that  of  Cyrus  in  favour  of  the 
Jews,  was  brought  to  Jerusalem.  It  was  about  the  ^iu^'-i. 
beginning  of  the  former  year,  that  Tatnai  sent  to  the 
king  about  it,  and  less  than  a  year's  time  cannot  be  well  al- 
lowed for  the  despatch  of  such  an  affair  ;  for  the  king  then 
residing  at  Shushan  in  Persia,  was  at  such  a  distance  from 
Judea,  that  the  journey  of  the  messenger  thither  to  him, 
could  not  take  up  less  than  three  months  time,  (for  Ezra 
was  four  months  in  coming  to  Judea  from  Babylon,*^  which 
was  at  least  one  quarter  of  the  way  nearer ;)  and,  on  his  ar- 
rival, it  cannot  be  supposed  that,  in  a  court  where  the  go- 
vernment of  so  large  an  empire  was  managed,  he  could  im- 
mediately come  at  a  despatch.  The  multiplicity  of  other 
affairs  there  agitated  must  necessarily  detain  him  some  time,^ 
before  it  could  come  to  his  turn  to  be  heard  for  the  delivery 
of  his  message  ;  and  when  he  had  obtained  an  order  to 
search  among  the  records  of  the  empire  for  the  decree  of 
Cyrus  (which  we  cannot  imagine  to  have  been  without  a  far- 
ther time  of  attendance,)  he  or  some  other  messenger  first 
went  to  Babylon,  to  make  the  search  there  ;  and  on  his  fail- 
ing of  finding  it  in  that  place,  he  went  from  thence  to  Ec- 
batana,"  the  capital  of  Media,  where,  having  found  the  en- 
rolment of  it,  (for  it  seems  Cyrus  was  there  when  he  granted 
it,)  he  returned  with  it  from  thence  to  Shushan.  In  which 
three  journeys  and  two  searches,  considering  the  distance  of 
the  said  three  places  from  each  other,  and  the  vast  number 

s  Zech.  i.  7.  t  Ezra  viF.  5. 

u  This  is  the  same  th«l  is  now  called  Tauris. 
Vol-.  I.-  36 


282  CONNtXiON  QK  THE  rilST6RY  OP  [pART  f. 

of  records  which,  in  the  registers  of  so  large  an  empire,  must 
be  turned  over  for  the  finding  of  that  which  was  searched 
for,  less  than  five  months  could  not  have  been  expended. 
And  when  the  record  of  Cyrus's  decree  was  brought  from  Ec- 
batana  to  Shushan,a  month  is  the  least  time  that  can  be  sup- 
posed for  the  despatch  of  the  new  decree  which  Darius  made 
in  confirmation  of  it :  and  then  three  months  more  must  be  al- 
lowed for  the  carrying  of  it  to  Tatnai,  and  from  him  to  Judea. 
All  which  put  together,  make  a  full  year  from  the  time  of 
Tatnai's  writing  his  letter,  to  the  time  of  the  arrival  of 
Darius's  decree  in  answer  to  it.  When  Tatnai  and  Shethar- 
boznai,  on  the  perusal  of  it,  found  how  strictly  the  king  re- 
quired obedience  to  be  given  thereto,  they  durst  not  but  act 
in  conformity  to  it  ;^  and  therefore  they  did  immediately  let 
the  Jews  know  hereof,  and  forthwith  took  care  to  have  it 
fully  and  ellectually  put  in  execution.  And  from  that  time, 
the  building  of  the  house  went  on  so  successfully,  that  it  was 
fully  finished  within  three  years  after  :  for,  by  virtue  of  this 
decree,  the  Jews  were  not  only  fully  authorized  to  go  on 
with  the  building,  but  were  also  furnished  with  the  expenses 
of  it  out  of  the  taxes  of  the  province.  This  had  been  granted 
by  Cyrus  in  the  former  decree,  but  by  the  underhand  dealings 
of  the  Samaritans,  and  other  enemies,  in  corrupting  those 
through  whose  hands  the  administration  of  the  public  affairs 
and  public  revenues  passed,  this  part  of  Cyrus's  decree  was  ren- 
dered inetfectual  during  a  great  part  of  his  reign,  and  through 
the  whole  reign  of  Cambyses.  And  therefore,  during  all  that 
time,  the  Jews  being  left  to  carry  on  the  work  at  their  own 
charges  only,  and  they  being  then  very  poor,  as  being  newly 
returned  from  their  captivity,  it  went  very  slowly  on.  But 
being  now  helped  again  by  the  king's  bounty,  they  followed 
it  with  that  diligence,  that  they  soon  brought  it  to  a  con- 
clusion. 

The  publishing  of  this  decree  at  Jerusalem  may  be  reck- 
oned the  thorough  restoration  of  the  Jewish  state  :  and  from 
the  thorough  destruction  of  it,  in  the  burning  of  the  city  and 
temple  of  Jerusalem  by  the  Chaldeans  to  this  time,  is  just 
seventy  years.  The  time  fallingspexactly,  and  the  prophet 
Zechariah  confirming  it,  by  expressing,  under  the  fourth 
year  of  Darius,  that  the  mourning  and  fasting  of  the  Jews 
for  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem.^  and  the  utter  driving  of 
them  out  of  the  land  on  the  death  of  Gedaliah,  was  then  just 
seventy  ycars,^  this  hath  given  a  plausible  handle  to  some 
for  the  placing  of  the  beginning  of  the  seventy  years  of 
the  Babylonish   captivity    spoken  of  by  Jeremiah,  at  the 

X  Esra  vi.  13.    Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  4. 

y  Zeeh.  vii.  1,  z  Zeclr.  vii.  5. 


BOOK  III.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  283 

destruction  of  Jerusalem,  and  the  end  of  them  at  the 
publication  of  this  decree  of  Darius.  But  the  Scripture 
plainly  tells  us,  that  these  seventy  years,  as  prophesied 
of  by  the  prophet  Jeremiah,'  began  from  the  fourth  year 
of  Jehoiakim,  and  expired  on  the  first  of  Cyrus,''  on  his 
then  granting  his  decree  for  the  rebuilding  of  the  temple, 
and  the  return  of  the  Jews  again  into  their  own  land.  But 
this  matter  will  admit  of  a  very  easy  reconciliation,  for  both 
computations  may  very  well  stand  together  ;  for  though  the 
Babylonish  captivity  did  begin  from  the  fourth  of  Jehoiakim, 
when  Nebuchadnezzar  first  subjugated  the  land,  and  carried 
away  to  Babylon  the  first  captives,  yet  it  was  not  completed 
till  he  had  absolutely  destroyed  it  in  the  eleventh  year  of 
Zedekiah,  which  was  just  eighteen  years  after.  And  so 
likewise,  though  the  deliverance  from  this  captivity,  and  the 
restoration  of  the  Jewish  state  thereon,  was  begun  by  the 
decree  of  Cyrus  in  the  first  year  of  his  reign  ;  yet  it  was  not 
completed  till  that  decree  was  put  in  full  vigour  of  execution 
by  the  decree  which  Darius  granted  in  the  fourth  year  of 
his  reign  for  the  confirmation  of  it ;  which  was  also  just 
eighteen  years  after.  And  therefore,  if  \vc  reckon  from  the 
beginning  of  the  captivity,  to  the  beginning  of  the  restora- 
tion, we  must  reckon  from  the  fourth  year  of  Jehoiakim  to 
the  first  of  Cyrus,  which  was  just  seventy  years  ;  and  if  we 
reckon  from  the  completion  of  the  captivity,  to  the  comple- 
tion of  the  restoration,  we  must  reckon  from  the  eleventh  of 
Zedekiah  to  the  fourth  of  Darius  ;  which  was  also  just 
seventy  years.  So  that  whether  we  reckon  from  the  be- 
ginning of  the  captivity  to  the  beginning  of  the  restoration, 
or  from  the  completing  of  the  captivity  to  the  completing  of 
the  restoration,  Jeremiah's  prophecy  of  the  seventy  years 
<;aptivity  will  be  both  ways  equally  accomplished  ;  and 
therefore,  I  doubt  not,  but  that  both  ways  were  equally  in- 
tended therein,  though  the  words  of  the  prophecy  seem 
chiefly  to  refer  to  the  former. 

On  the  publication  of  this  decree  of  Darius,  and  the  care 
that  was  taken  to  have  it  fully  put  in  execution,  without  suf- 
fering any  of  those  devices  to  obstruct  it,  which  had  rendered 
the  former  decree  ineffectual,  the  work  of  the  temple  went 
on  very  successfully,  and  the  state  of  the  Jews  in  Judea  and 
Jerusalem  seemed  so  thoroughly  restored,  that  the  Jews  who 
were  in  Babylon,  on  their  having  had  an  account  hereof, 
thought  it  might  not  be  any  longer  proper  to  keep  those  fasts, 
which  hitherto  they  had  observed  for  seventy  years  past,  for 
the  destruction  which  Judca  and  Jerusalem  had  sufiered  from 

a  Jer.  XXV.  h  2  Chron.  Jixwi.  20— 2S. 


284,  CQ^N'EXlON  OP  THE  HISTOnV   OF  f  PART  I. 

the  Chaldeans  in  the  tinne  of  Zcdekiah,  as  looking  on  them 
now  to  have  obtained  a  thorough  restoration  from  i  t ;  and  there- 
fore sent  nnessengers  to  Jerusalem,  Sharezer,  and  Regem- 
melech,  to  ask  advice  of  the  priests  and  prophets,  that  were 
there  concerning  this  matter/  For,  from  the  time  of  the  des- 
truction of  the  city  and  temple  of  Jerusalem,  the  Jews  of 
the  captivity  had  kept  four  fasts  in  commemoration  of  the 
calamities  which  then  happened  to  their  nation  ;  the  first  on 
the  tenth  day  of  the  tenth  month,''  because  then  Nebuchad- 
nezzar first  laid  siege  to  Jerusalem,  in  the  ninth  year  of  Zc- 
dekiah ;  the  second  on  the  ninth  day  of  the  fourth  month,^ 
because  on  that  day  the  city  was  taken;  the  third  on  the 
tenth  day  of  the  fifth  month,^  because  then  the  city  and  tem- 
ple were  burned  by  Nebuzaradan  ;  and  the  fourth  on  the 
third  day  of  the  seventh  month,^  because  on  that  day  Gedaliah 
was  slain,  and  the  remainder  of  the  people  were  thereondis- 
persed  and  driven  out  of  the  land_,  which  completed  tiie  de- 
solation of  it.  Concerning  all  \\hicl>  fasts,  and  the  question 
of  the  Babylonish  Jews  proposed  concerning  them,  God  gave 
them  by  the  prophet  Zechariah  that  answer  which  we  have  in 
the  seventh  and  eighth  chapters  of  his  prophecies.  Therein 
the  fasts  of  the  fifth  and  seventh  months  are  said  to  have  been 
observed  for  seventy  years  past.**  And,  from  the  nineteentfi 
year  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  according  to  the  Jewish  account, 
(which  was  the  seventeenth  according  to  the  Babylonish  ac- 
count,') when  Jerusalem  was  destroyed,  to  the  fourth  year  of 
Darius  Hystaspes,  wh.en  the  Jewish  state  was  again  thoroughly 
restored,  were  just  seventy  years,  according  to  the  canon  of 
Ptolemy ;  so  the  sacred  and  profane  chronology  do  both  ex- 
actly agree  in  this  matter.  The  Jews  still  observe  these  four 
fasts,  even  to  this  day,  though  not  exactly  on  the  same  days 
in  their  present  calendar,  as  in  the  former.'' 

In  the  beginning  of  the  fifth  year  of  Darius,  happened  the 

revolt  of  the  Babylonians,'  which  cost  him  the  trouble 
^ariu^s.    of  a  tcdious  sicge  again  to  reduce  them,  for  it  lasted 

twenty   months.     This  city  havifig,  for   many  years 
during  the  Babylonish  empire,  been  the  mis^trcss  of  the  East, 

c  Zech.  vii.  d  2  Kings  xxv.  1.     Jer.  lii.  4.     Zecli.  viii.  19. 

e  2  Kin^s  xxv.  3.     Jer.  xx'ix.  2.     Zecli.  viii.  19. 

f  Jer.  lii.  12.     Zech.  vii.  3,  5  ;  viii.  19. 

s;  Jer.  xli.  1.     Zech.  vii.  5  ;  viii,  19. 

h  Zechariah  vii.  1.  i  2  Kings  xxv.  8.     Jer.  lii.  12. 

k  Their  present  calendar  was  made  by  K.  HjiiRJ,  about  the  year  of  our 
Lord  360.  Their  former  year  was  a  lunar  year,  reconciled  to  a  solar  by  in- 
tercalations, but  in  what  form  is  uncertain,  only  it  was  always  to  have  its 
beginning  about  the  time  of  the  vernal  equinox,  to  which  season,  the  pro- 
ducts of  their  flocks  and  their  fields,  which  were  required  to  be  nse(J  at  tlreir 
leasts  of  the  Fassover,  and  tiie  Pentecost,  necessarily  fixed  it. 

I  Herodotus,  lib.  S.     .Tlisiin.  lib.  I.  »-,T0.     Polvppnu?.  lib.  7- 


BOOK  in.]       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.        285 

and  domineered  over  all  the  countries  round  about  them, 
could  not  bear  the  subjection  which  they  were  fallen  under 
to  the  Persians,  especially  after  they  had  removed  the  impe- 
rial seat  of  the  empire  from  Babylon  to  Shushan  :  for  that 
much  diminished  tlie  grandeur,  pride,  and  wealth  of  the 
place,  which  they  thought  they  could  no  other  way  again  re- 
trieve, but  by  setting  themselves  up  against  the  Persians 
under  a  king  of  their  own,  in  the  same  manner  as  they  had 
formerly  done,  under  Nabopolassar,  against  the  Assyrians. 
And,  therefore,  taking  the  advantage  of  the  revolution,  which 
happened  in  the  Persian  empire,  first  on  the  death  of  Cam- 
byses,  and  after  on  the  slaying  of  the  Magians,  they  began  to 
lay  in  all  manner  of  provisions  tor  the  war;  and,  after  they 
had  covertly  done  Ibis  for  four  years  together,  till  they  had 
fully  stored  the  city  for  many  years  to  come,  in  the  fifth  year 
they  broke  out  into  an  open  revolt,  which  drew  Darius  upon 
them,  with  all  his  forces,  to  besiege  the  city.  In  the  beginning 
of  the  third  year  of  Darius,  we  learn  from  the  prophet  Ze- 
chariah,  that  the  whole  empire  was  then  in  peace  ;™  and 
therefore  the  revolt  could  not  then  have  happened  :  and  the 
message  of  Sharezer  and  Uegem-melech  from  Babylon,"  in 
the  fourth  year  of  his  reign,  proves  the  same  for  that  year 
also  ;  and  therefore  it  could  not  be  till  the  tifth  year  that  this 
war  broke  out.  As  soon  as  the  Babylonians  saw  themselves 
begirt  by  such  an  army,  as  they  could  not  cope  with  in  the 
field,  they  turned  their  thoughts  wholly  to  the  supporting  of 
themselves  in  the  siege  :"  in  order  whereto,  they  took  a  reso- 
lution the  most  desperate  and  barbarous  that  ever  any  nation 
practised.  For,  to  make  their  provisions  last  the  longer, 
they  agreed  to  cut  off  all  unnecessary  mouths  among  them  ; 
and  therefore,  drawing  together  all  the  women  and  children, 
they  strangled  them  all,  whether  wives,  sisters,  daughters,  or 
young  children,  unless  for  the  wars,  excepting  only,  that 
every  man  was  allowed  to  save  one  of  his  wives  which  he 
best  loved,  and  a  maid-servant  to  do  the  work  of  the  house. 
And  hereby  was  very  signally  fulfilled  the  prophecy  of  Isaiah 
against  them,  in  which  he  foretold,  "That  two  things  should 
come  to  them  in  a  moment,  in  one  day,  the  loss  of  children 
and  widowhood  :  and  that  these  should  come  upon  them  in 
their  perfection,  for  the  multitude  of  their  sorceries,  and  the 
great  abundance  of  their  enchantments. "p  And  in  what 
greater  perfection  could  these  calamities  come  upon  them, 
than  when  they  themselves,  thus  upon  themselves,  became  the 
executioners  of  them  ?  And  in  many  other  particulars  did  God 
then  execute  his  vengeance  upon  this  wicked  and  abominable 

m  Zech.  i.  11 — 15.  n  Zech.  vii.  1 — 3. 

o  Herodotus,  lib.  3.  p  Isaiah  xlvii.  9 


286  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

city,  which  was  foretold  by  several  of  the  prophets ;  and  the 
Jews  were  as  often  warned  to  come  out  of  the  place,  before  the 
time  of  its  approach,  that  they  might  not  be  involved  in  it.i 
And  especially  the  prophet  Zechariah,  about  two  years  be- 
fore, sent  them  a  call  from  God,  that  is,  ''  to  Zion,  tliat  dwelt 
with  the  daughter  of  Babylon,  to  flee  and  come  forth  from 
that  land,'"'  that  they  might  be  delivered  from  the  plague 
which  God  was  going  to  inflict  upon  it.  And  when  Sharczer 
and  Regem-melech  returned  to  Babylon,  no  doubt,  they  car- 
ried back  with  them,  from  this  prophet,  a  repetition  of  the 
same  call  :  and  although  it  be  nowhere  said  that  they  paid 
obedience  to  it,  and  so  saved  themselves,  yet  we  may  take  it 
for  certain  that  they  did,  and,  by  seasonably  removing  from 
Babylon  before  the  siege  began,  avoided  partaking  of  the 
calamities  of  it ;  for  almost  all  the  prophecies  concerning 
this  heavy  judgment  upon  Babylon  speaking  of  it  as  the 
vengeance  of  God  upon  them  for  their  cruel  dealings  with  his 
people,  when  they  were  delivered  into  their  hands,  and  they 
all  at  the  same  time  promising  peace,  mercy,  and  favour,  to 
ail  that  were  of  his  people,  and  particularly  such  a  promise 
having  been  sent  them  but  the  year  before^  by  Sharezer  and 
Regem-melech,  it  is  utterly  inconsistent  with  the  whole  tenor 
of  these  sacred  predictions,  that  any  of  the  Jewish  nation 
should  be  sufferers  with  the  Babylonians  in  this  war  ;  and 
therefore  we  may  assuredly  infer,  that  they  were  all  gone  out 
of  this  place  before  this  war  began. 

Darius  having  lain  before  Babylon  a  year  and  eight  months, 

at  length,  toward   the  end  of  the  sixth  year  of  his 
pariufe!  reign,*  he  took  it  by  the  stratagem  of  Zopyrus,  one  of 

his  chief  commanders :  for  he,  having  cut  off  his  nose 
and  ears,  and  mangled  his  body  all  over  with  stripes,  fled  in 
this  condition  to  the  besieged  ;  where  feigning  to  have  suf- 
fered all  this  by  the  cruel  usage  of  Darius,  he  grew  thereby 
so  far  into  their  confidence,  as  at  length  to  be  made  the  chief 
commander  of  their  forces;  which  trust  he  made  use  of  to 
deliver  the  city  to  his  master,  which  could  scarce  have  been 
any  other  way  taken  :  for  the  walls,  by  reason  of  their  height 
and  strength,  made  the  place  impregnable  against  all  storms, 
batteries,  and  assaults;  and  it  being  furnished  with  provi- 
sions for  a  great  many  years,  and  having  also  large  quantities 
of  void  ground  within  the  city,  from  the  cultivation  of  which 
it  might  annually  be  supplied  with  much  more,  it  could  never 

q  Isaiah  xlviii.  20.    Jer.  1.  S  ;  li.  6, 9, 45. 

r  Zecti.  ii.  6 — 9.  s  Zech.  viii. 

t  Herodotus,  lib.  3.     Justin,  lib.  1,  c.  10.     PotyaenuSjlib.  7. 


HOOKIII.J  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  287 

have  been  starved  into  a  surrender  ;"  and  therefore  at  length 
it  must  have  wearied  and  worn  out  Darius,  and  all  his  army, 
had  it  not  been  thus  delivered  into  his  hands  by  this  strata- 
gem of  Zopyrus,  for  which  he  deservedly  rewarded  him  with 
the  highest  honours  he  could  heap  on  him  all  his  life  after. 
As  soon  as  Darius  was  master  of  the  place,  he  took  away  all 
their  one  hundred  gates,*  and  beat  down  their  walls  from 
two  hundred  cubits  (which  was  their  former  height)  to  fifty 
cubits  ;y  and  of  these  walls  only,  Strabo,*^  and  other  after- 
writers  are  to  be  understood,  when  they  describe  the  walls 
of  Babylon  to  be  no  more  than  fifty  cubits  high.  And  as  to  the 
inhabitants,  after  having  given  them  for  a  spoil  to  his  Persians, 
who  had  been  before  their  servants,  according  to  the  pro- 
phecy of  Zechariah,  ii.  9,  and  impaled  three  thousand  of  the 
most  guilty  and  active  of  them  in  the  revolt,  he  pardoned  all 
the  rest.  But,  by  reason  of  the  destruction  they  had  made 
of  their  women  in  the  beginning  of  the  siege,  he  was  forced 
to  send  for  fifty  thousand  of  that  sex  out  of  the  other  pro- 
vinces of  the  empire,  to  supply  them  with  wives,  without 
which  the  place  must  soon  have  become  depopulated  for  want 
of  propagation. 

And  here  it  is  to  be  observed,  that  the  punishment  of  Ba- 
bylon kept  pace  with  the  restoration  of  Judah  and  Jerusalem, 
according  to  the  prophecy  of  the  prophet  Jeremiah,  xxv.  12, 
13,  whereby  he  foretold,  that  "  when  the  seventy  years  of 
vTudah's  captivity  should  be  accomplished,  God  would  pun- 
ish the  king  of  Babylon,  and  that  nation  for  their  iniquity,  and 
the  land  of  the  Chaldeans,  and  would  make  it  a  perpetual 
desolation,  and  would  bring  upon  that  land  all  the  words 
which  he  had  pronounced  against  it."  For  accordingly, 
Avhen  the  restoration  of  Judah  began,  in  the  first  of  Cyrus, 
after  the  expiration  of  the  first  seventy  years,  that  is,  from  the 
fourth  of  Jehoiakim  to  the  first  of  Cyrus,  then  began  Baby- 
lon's punishment,  in  being  conquered  and  subjected  to  the 
Persians,  in  the  same  manner  as  they  had  conquered  and  sub- 
jected the  Jews  to  them  in  the  beginning  of  the  said  seventy 
years.  And,  after  the  expiration  of  the  second  seventy  years, 
that  is,  from  the  nineteenth  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  when  Judah 
and  Jerusalem  were  thoroughly  desolated,  to  the  fourth  of 
Darius,  when  the  restoration  of  both  was  completed,  then 
the  desolation  of  Babylon  was  also  in  a  great  measure  com- 
pleted, in  the  devastation  which  was  then  brought  upon  it 
by  Darius.     In  the  first  part  of  their  punishment,  their  king 

u  Quintus  Curtius,  lib.  5,  c.  1.  Per  90  stadia  habitatur,  ca?tera  serunt  co- 
luntque,  ut  si  externa  vis  ingruat,  obsessis  alimenta  ex  ipsius  urbis  solo  sub 
ministrenlur. 

X  Jer.  Ii.  58.     Herodot.  ibid.  y  Jer.  I.  15  ;  li.  41, 58,     Herodot.  ibid. 

z  Strabo,  lib.  16 


288  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OK  [PART  V. 

ivas  slain  and  their  city  taken  ;  and  thenceforth,  from  being 
the  lady  of  kingdoms ^^  and  mistress  of  all  the  East,  it  became 
subject  to  the  Persians.  And  whereas  before  it  had  been  the 
metropolis  of  a  great  empire,  this  honour  was  now  taken 
from  it,  and  the  imperial  seat  removed  from  thence  to  Shu- 
shan  or  Susa  (for  this  seems  to  have  been  done  in  the  first 
year  of  Cyrus's  reign  over  the  whole  empire.)  and  Babylon 
thenceforth,  instead  of  having  a  king,  had  only  a  deputy  re- 
siding there,  who  governed  it  as  a  province  of  the  Persian 
empire.  And  at  the  same  time  that  the  city  was  thus  brought 
under,  the  country  was  desolated  and  destroyed  by  the  in- 
undation that  was  caused,  by  turning  of  the  river  on  the  taking 
of  the  city,  which  hath  been  already  spoken  of,  and  thereon 
it  became  a  possession  for  the  bittern^  and  pools  of  water,  as 
the  prophet  Isaiah  foretold,  chap.  xiv.  23.  "  And  the  sea 
came  up  upon  Babylon  and  she  was  covered  with  the  mul- 
titude of  the  waves  thereof,"  according  as  Jeremiah  prophe- 
sied hereof,  chap.  li.  42.  And,  in  the  second  part  of  their 
punishment,  on  Darius's  taking  the  place,  all  that  calamity 
and  devastation  was  brought  upon  it.  which  hath  been  already 
spoken  of;  and  from  that  it  did  never  any  more  recover 
itself,  but  languished  a  while,  and  at  length  ended,  accord- 
ing to  the  words  of  Jeremiah,  in  a  perpetual  desolation. 

In  the  sixth  year  of  Darius,  according  to  the  Jewish  ac- 
count, and  on  the  third  day  of  the  twelfth  month, called 
ciriut'li  the  month  of  Adar  (which  answered  to  part  of  the 
third,  and  part  of  the  fourth  month  of  the  Babylonish 
year,  and  consequently  was  in  the  seventh  year  of  Darius, 
according  to  the  Babylonish  account,)''  the  building  of  the 
temple  at  Jerusalem  was  finished,  and  the  dedication  of  it 
was  celebrated  by  the  priests  and  Levites,  and  all  the  rest  of 
the  congregationof  Israel,  with  great  joy  and  solemnity.  And, 
among  other  sacrifices  then  offered,  there  was  a  sin-otfering 
for  all  Israel  of  twelve  he-goats,  according  to  the  number 
of  the  tribes  of  Israel  ;  which  is  a  farther  addition  of  proof 
to  what  hath  been  above  said,  that,  on  the  return  of  Judah 
and  Benjamin  from  the  Babylonish  captivity,  some  also  of 
each  of  the  other  tribes  of  Israel  returned  with  them  out  of 
Assyria,  Babylon,  and  Media,  whither  they  had  been  before 
carried,  and,  joining  with  them  in  the  rebuilding  of  the  tem- 
ple (to  which  they  had  originally  an  equal  right,)  partook 
also  in  the  solemnity  of  this  dedication  ;  otherwise  there  is 
no  reason  why  any  such  offering  should  have  been  then  made 
in  their  behalf.  But  the  most  of  them  that  returned  being 
of  the  tribe  of  Judah.  that  swallowed  up  the  names  of  all  the 

a  Isaiah  xlviii  5  b  Ezra  vi.  15 — 16 


BOOK  lU.j  THE  OLD  AND  JiTEW  TESTAMENTS.  :2c39 

rest ;  for  from  this  time  the  whole  people  of  Israc],  of  what 
tribe  soever  they  were,  began  to  be  called  Jews  5*^  and  by 
that  name  they  have  all  of  them  been  ever  since  known  all 
the  world  over. 

•  This  work  was  twenty  years  in  finishing  :  for  so  many 
years  were  elapsed,  from  the  second  of  Cyrus,  when  it  was 
first  begun,  to  the  seventh  of  Darius,  when  it  was  fully  finish- 
ed. During  the  latter  part  of  the  reign  of  Cyrus,  and 
through  the  whole  reign  of  Cambyses,  it  met  with  such  dis- 
couragements, through  the  fraudulent  devices  of  the  Sama- 
ritans, that  it  went  but  slowly  on  for  all  that  time  :  and,  du- 
ring the  usurpation  of  the  Magians,  and  for  almost  two  years 
after,*^  it  was  wholly  suppressed,  that  is,  till  towards  the  lat- 
ter end  of  the  second  year  of  the  reign  of  Darius.  But  then 
it  being  again  resumed,  on  the  preaching  of  the  prophets 
Haggai  and  Zechariah,  and  afterward  encouraged  and  help- 
ed forward  by  the  decree  of  Darius,  it  was  thenceforth  car- 
ried on  with  that  vigour,  especially  through  the  exhortations 
and  prophecies  of  the  two  prophets  I  have  mentioned,  that, 
in  the  beginning  of  the  seventh  year  of  Darius,  it  was  fully 
finished,  and  dedicated  anew  to  the  service  of  God,  in  the 
manner  as  hath  been  said.  In  this  dedication,  the  I46th5 
the  I47th,  and  the  148th  Psalms  seem  to  have  been  sung  : 
for,  in  the  Septuagint  versions,  they  are  styled  The  Psalms 
of  Haggai  and  Zechariah,  as  if  they  had  been  composed  by 
them  for  this  occasion  ;  and  this,  no  doubt,  was  from  some 
ancient  tradition  :  but,  in  the  original  Hebrew,  these  Psalms 
have  no  such  title  prefixed  to  them,  neither  have  they  any 
other  to  contradict  it. 

The  decree  whereby  this  temple  was  finished  having  been 
granted  by  Darius  at  his  palace  in  Shushan,  (or  Susa,  as  the 
Greeks  call  the  place,)  in  remembrance  hereof,®  the  eastern 
gate,  in  the  outer  wall  of  the  temple,  was  from  this  time 
called  the  gate  of  Shushan,  and  a  picture  and  draught  of 
that  city  was  portrayed  in  sculpture  over  it,  and  there 
continued  till  the  last  destruction  of  that  temple  by  the 
Romans. 

In  the  next  month  after  the  dedication,  which  was  the 
month  Nisan,  the  first  of  the  Jewish  year,  the  temple  being 
now  made  fit  for  all  parts  of  the  divine  service,*"  the  passover 
was  observed  in  it  on  the  fourteenth  day  of  that  month,  accord- 
ing to  the  law  of  God,  and  solemnized  by  all  the  children  of 
Israel   that  were  then    returned  from    the   captivity,  with 

c  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  5.     Euseb.  Demonsf.  Evang.  lib.  8. 
d  In  1  Esdras  v.  73,  it  is  said,  that  tlie  time  of  the  stop  which  was  put  to 
the  building  was  two  ■years, 
e  See  Lightfoot  of  the  Temple,  c.  3.  f  Ezra  vi,  19—22. 

Vol.  J,  fM 


290       OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS  CONNECTED. 

great  joy  and  gladness  of  heart,  because,  saith  the  book  ot 
Ezra,^  "  The  Lord  hath  made  them  joyful,  and  turned  the 
heart  of  the  king  of  Assyria  unto  them,  to  strengthen  their 
hands  in  the  work  of  the  house  of  God,  the  God  of  Israel  :" 
from  whence  archbishop  Usher  infers,''  that  Babylon  must 
necessarily  have  been  reduced  by  Darius  before  this  time  ; 
for  otherwise,  he  thinks,  he  could  not  have  been  here  styled 
king  of  Assyria,  Babylon  being  then  the  metropolis  of  that 
kingdom. 

And  if  we  will  add  one  stage  more  to  the  two  above  men- 
tioned, of  the  captivity  and  restoration  of  Judah,  and  place 
the  full  completion  of  the  captivity  in  the  twenty-third 
of  Nebuchadnezzar,  according  to  the  Jewish  account 
(which  was  the  twenty-first  according  to  the  Babylonish,)^ 
when  Nebuzaradan  carried  away  the  last  remainder  of  the 
land  ;  and  the  full  completion  of  the  restoration  at  the  finish- 
ing of  the  temple,  and  the  restoration  of  the  divine  worship 
therein  ;  this  stage  will  have  the  like  distance  of  seventy  years 
for  the  dedication  of  this  temple,  and  the  solemnizing  of  the 
first  passover  in  it,  being  in  the  seventh  year  of  Darius,  it 
will  fall  in  the  seventieth  year  from  the  said  twenty-third  of 
Nebuchadnezzar,  according  to  Ptolemy's  canon. '^  So  that 
taking  it  which  way  you  will,  and  at  what  stage  you  please, 
the  prophecy  of  Jeremiah  will  be  fully  and  exactly  accom- 
plished concerning  this  matter.  And,  here  ending  the  re- 
building of  the  second  temple,  1  shall  herewith  end  this  book. 


g  Ezravi.  22.  h  Annales  Veteris  Testauienti,  sub.  A.  M.  3489. 

i  Jer.  lii.  30. 

k  That  is,  reckoning  the  twenty-third  year  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  according 
to  tlie  Jewish  account,  to  be  the  twenty-first  according  to  the  Babylonish, 
account,  which  Ptolemv  weut  b%. 


OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS 

CONNECTED,  &c. 


BOOK  IV. 

The  Samaritans,  still  carrying  on   their  former  spite  and 
rancour  against  the  Jews,  gave  them  new  trouble  on  this  occa- 
tion.     The  tribute  of  Samaria  had  been  assigned  first 
by  Cjrus,^  and  afterward  by  Darius,''  for  the  repara-    i^riufs' 
tion  of  the  temple  at  Jerusalem,  and  the  furnishing 
of  the  Jews  with  sacrifices,  that  oblations  and  prayers  might 
there  daily  be  oflfered  up  for  the  king,  and  the  royal  family, 
and  for  the    welfare  and  prosperity  of  the  Persian  empire.'^ 
This  was  a  matter  of  great  regret  and   heart-burning  to  the 
Samaritans,  and  was  in  truth  the  source  and  the  true  original 
reason  of  all  the  oppositions  which  they  made  against  them : 
for  they  thought  it  an  indignity  upon   them  to  be   forced  to 
pay  their  tribute  to    the  Jews  ;  and  therefore   they  did,  by 
bribes  and  other  underhand  dealings,  prevail  with  the  minis- 
ters and  other  officers,  to  whose  charge  this  matter  belong- 
ed, during  the  latter  part  of  the  reign  of  Cyrus,  and  all  the 
time  of  Cambyses,  to  put  a  stop  to  this  assignment,  and  did 
all  else  that  they  could  wholly  to   quash  it.*^     But  the  grant 
being  again  renewed  by  Darius,®  and  the  execution  of  it  so 
strictly  enjoined  in  the  manner  as  hath  been  before  related, 
the  tribute  was  thenceforth  annually  paid,  to  the  end  for  which 
it  was  assigned,  without  any  more  gainsaying,  till  this  year. 
But  now,  on  pretence  that  the  temple  was  finished,  (though 
the  out-buildings  still  remained  unrepaired,  and  were  not 
finished  till  many  years  after,)  they   refused  to  let  the  Jews 
any   longer  to  have  the  tribute  -J^  alleging,  that  it  being  as- 
signed them  for  the  repairing  of  their  temple,  now  the  tem- 
ple was  repaired,  the  end  of  that  assignment  was  ceased,  and 

a  Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  1.        b  Joseph,  lib.  11,  c.  4. 

c  Ezra  vi.  8 — 10.  d  Ezra  iv.  5.     Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c,  2. 

e  Ezra  vi.  f  Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  4. 


292  coNNEXiorr  op  the  histoey  of  [part  i. 

that  consequently  the  payment  of  the  said  tribute  was  to 
cease  with  it,  and  for  this  reason  would  pay  it  no  longer  to 
them.  Whereon  the  Jews,  to  right  themselves  in  this  matter, 
sent  Zerubbabel  the  governor,  with  Mordccai  and  Ananias, 
two  other  principal  men  among  them,  with  a  complaint  to 
Darius  of  the  wrong  thai  was  done  them  in  the  detaining  of 
his  royal  bounty  from  them,  contrary  to  the  purport  of  the 
edict  which  he  had  in  that  behalf  made.  The  king,  on  the 
hearing  of  the  complaint,  and  the  informing  of  himself  about 
it,  issued  out  his  royal  order  to  his  officers  at  Samaria,  strictly 
requiring  and  commanding  them  to  take  effectual  care,  that 
the  Samaritans  observe  his  edict,  in  paying  their  tribute  to 
the  temple  of  Jerusalem,  as  formerly,  and  no  more,  on  any 
pretence  whatsoever,  give  the  Jews  any  cause  for  the  future 
to  complain  of  their  failure  herein.  And  after  this  we  hear 
no  more  of  any  opposition  or  contest  concerning  this  matter, 
till  the  time  of  Sanballat ;  which  was  many  years  after. 

From  the  time  of  the  reduction  of  Babylon,  Darius  had 
set  himself  to  make  great  preparations  for  a  war  against  the 
Scythians,  that  inhabited  those  countries  which  lie  between 
the  Danube  and  the  Tanais  ;S  his  pretence  for  it  was  to  be 
revenged  on  them  for  their  having  invaded  Asia,  and  held  it 
in  subjection  to  them  twenty-eight  years,  as  hath  been  afore 
related.  This  was  in  the  time  of  Cyaxares,  the  first  of  that 
name,  king  of  Media,  about  oiie  hundred  and  twenty  years 
before.  But  for  want  of  a  better  colour  for  that  which  his 
ambition  and  thirst  for  conquest  only  led  him  to,  this  was 
given  out  for  the  reason  of  the  war.  In  order  whereto, 
having  drawn  together  an  army  of  seven  hundred  thousand 
men,  he  marched  with  them  to  the  Thracian  Bospho- 
»a'rfJs\  '"'^Js,  and  having  there  passed  over  it  on  a  bridge  of 
boats,  he  brought  all  Thrace  in  subjection  to  him  ; 
and  then  marched  to  the  Ister  or  Danube,  where  he  appoint- 
ed his  fleet  to  come  to  him,  (which  consisted  mostly  of  loni- 
ans,  and  other  Grecian  nations,  dwelling  in  the  mari- 
time parts  of  Asia,  and  on  the  Hellespont;  he  there  passed 
over  another  bridge  of  boats  into  the  country  of  the  Scy- 
thians, and  having  there,  for  three  months  time,  pursued 
them  through  several  desert  and  uncultivated  countries,  where 
they  drew  him  by  their  flight  of  purpose  to  harass  and  de- 
stroy his  army,  he  was  glad  at  last  to  return  with  one  half 
of  them,  having  lost  the  other  half  in  this  unfortunate  and 
ill-projected  expedition.  And,  had  not  the  lonians,  by  the 
persuasion  of  Hestiasus,  prince  of  Miletus,  (or  tyrant,  as 
the  Grecians  call  him,)  contrary  to  the  opinion  of   others 

g  Herodotus,  lib.  4.     Justin,  lib.  2.  c.  5.    Cornelius  Nepos  in  Milliade 


BOOK  IV.]     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.         293 

among  thera,  staid  with  the  fleet  to  afford  him  a  passage 
back,  he  and  all  the  rest  must  have  perished  also.  Miltiades, 
prince  of  the  Thracian  Chersonesus,  which  lies  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Hellespont,  being  one  of  those  who  attended  Darius 
with  his  ships,  was  earnest  for  their  departure,  and  the  first 
that  moved    it,    telling  them,    that,    by    their    going    away 
and  leaving  Darius  and  his  army  to  perish  on  the  other  side 
of  the    Danube,  they  had  a  fair  opportunity  of  breaking  the 
power  of  the  Persians,  and   delivering  themselves  from  the 
yoke    of  that  tyranny  which    would  be    to    the  advantage 
of  every  one  of  their  respective  countries.     This  was  urged 
by  him  in  a  council  of  the  chief  commanders  ;  and  would 
certainly  have  taken    place,  but  that  Hestiagus,  in  answer 
hereto,  soon  made    them    sensible    what  a  dangerous  risk 
they  were  going  to  run  ;  for  he  convinced  them,  that  if  this 
were  done,  the  people  of  each  of  their  cities,  being  freed 
from    the  fear    of   the    Persians,    would    immediately  rise 
upon  them  to  recover  their  liberties:  and  this  would  end  in 
the  ruin  of  every  one  of  them,  who  now,  with  sovereign 
authority,  under  the  protection  of  Darius,  securely  reigned 
over  them  :    which  being  the  true  state  of  their  case,  this 
argument  prevailed  with    them  ;  so  that  they  all  resolved 
to  stay:  and  this  gave  Darius  the  means  of  again  repass- 
ing the  river  into  Thrace,  where  having  left  Megabyzus,  one 
of  his  chief  commanders,  with  part  of  his  army,  to  finish  his 
conquests  in  those  parts,  and  thoroughly  settle  the  country 
in  his  obedience,  he  repassed  the  Bosphorus  with  the  rest, 
and  retired  to  Sardis,  where  he  staid  all  the  winter,  and 
the  most    part  of  the  ensuing  year,  to  refresh  his  broken 
forces,  and  resettle  his  affairs  in  those  parts  of  his  empire, 
after  the  shock  that  had  been  given  them,  by  the  baffle  and 
loss  which  he  had  sustained  in  this  ill-advised  expedition. 

Megabyzus,  having  reduced  most  of  the  nations  of  Thrace 
under  the  Persian  yoke,  returned  to  Sardis  to  Da 
rius,  and  from  thence  accompanied  hin:  to  Susa,  c^is^io. 
whither  he  marched  back  about  the  end  of  the  year, 
after  having  appointed  Artaphernes,  one  of  his  brothers, 
governor  of  Sardis,  and  Otanes  chief  commander  of  Thrace, 
and  the  maritime  parts  adjoining,  in  the  place  of  Megabyzus.*" 
This  Otanes  was  the  son  of  Sisainnes,  one  of  the  royal 
judges  of  Persia,  who  having  been  convicted  of  bribery 
and  corruption  by  Carnbyses,  there  is  related  this  remark- 
able instance  of  ihat  king's  justice  towards  him,  that  he 
caused  him  to  be  flayed  alive,  and  making  with  his  skin  a 
covering  for  the  seat  of  the   tribunal,  made  this  his  son, 

h  Herodotus,  lib.  6 


294  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OP  [pART  I. 

whom  he  appointed  to  succeed  him  in  his  office,  to  sit  there- 
on, that  being  thus  put  in  mind  of  his  father's  punishment, 
he  might  thereby  be  admonished  to  avoid  his  crime.' 

The  Scythians,  to  be  revenged  on  Darius  for  his  inva- 
ding their  country,  passed  over  the  Danube,  and  ra- 
D*riusi2.  vaged  all  those  parts  of  Thrace,  that  had  submitted 
to  the  Persians,  a?  far  as  the  Hellcspotil  -^^  whereon 
Miltiades,  to  avoid  their  rage,  fled  from  the  Chcrsonesus  ; 
but,  on  the  retreat  of  the  enemy,  he  returned,  and  was  again 
reinstated  in  his  former  power  by  the  inhabitants  of  the 
country. 

About  this  time  Darius,  being  desirous  to  enlarge  his  do- 
minions    eastward,    in    order  to  the    coii(]uering   of 
i^ri'iK  13.  those  countries,  laid  a  design  of  first  making  a  dis- 
covery of  them  ;  for  which  purpose  having  built    a 
fleet  of  ships  at  Caspatyrus,  a  city  on  the  riv<'r  Indus,  and  as 
far  up  upon  it  as  the  borders  of  Scythia,  he  gave  the  com- 
mand of  it  to  Scylax,  a  Grecian  of  Caryandia,  a  city  in  Caria, 
and    one    well    skilled    in  maritime  affairs ;    and  sent    him 
down  the  river  to  make  the  best  discoveries  he  could  of  all 
the  parts  which  lay  on  the  banks  of  it  on  either  side  ;'  order- 
ing him,  for  this  end,  to  sail  down  the  current,  till  he  should 
arrive    at    the   mouth  of  the  river,  and   that  then,  passing 
through  it  into  the  Southern   ocean,    he  should  shape  his 
course  westward,  and  that  way  return  home  :   which  orders 
he  having  exactly  executed,  he  returned   by  the  straits  of 
Babelmande!  and  the  Red  Sea,  and,  on  the  thirtieth  month 
after  his  first  setting  out  from  Caspatyrus,  landed  in  Egypt, 
at    the    same    place  from  whence  Necho,  king  of   Egypt, 
formerly  sent   out  his    Phoenicians  to  sail  round  the  coasts 
of  Africa,  which   it  is    most  likely  was  the  port  where  now 
the  town  of  Suez  stands,  at  the  hither  end  of  the  said  Red 
Sea.     And  from  (hence  he  went  to  Susa,  and  (here  gave 
Darius  an  account  of  all  the  discoveries  which  he  had  made. 
After  this  Darius  entered   India  with  an  army,  and  brought 
all  that  large  country  under  him,  and  made  it  the  twen(ieth 
prefecture   of  his  empire;™  from  whence  he  aimually  re- 
ceived a  tribute  of  three  hundred  and  sixty  talents  of  gold, 
according   to  the  number  of  the  day*  of  the  then  Persian 
year,  appointing  a  talent  (o  be  paid  him  for  every  day  in  it. 
This  payment  was   made  him  according  to   the   standard  of 
the  Euboic  talent,  which  was  near  the  same  with  the  Attic; 

i  Herodotus,  lib.  6.     Valerius  Maxiraus,  lib.  6,  c.  3.    Ammianus  Marcelli- 
nus,  lib.  24. 

k  Herodotus,  lib.  6.  I  Herodotus,  lib.  4. 

m  Herodotus,  lib.  3.  ^ 


BOOK  IV.J       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.         295 

and  therefore,  according  to  the  lowest  computation,  it" 
amounted  to  the  value  of  one  million  ninety-five  thousand 
pounds  sterling. 

A  sedition  happening  in  Naxus,  the  chief  island  of  the 
Cyclades  in  the  ^Egean  Sea,  now  called  the  Archi- 
pelago, and  the  better  sort  being  therein  overpower-  Da"\u^ig 
ed  by  the  greater  number,  many  of  the  wealthiest  of 
the  inhabitants  were  expelled  the  island,  and  driven  into 
banishment;  whereon  retiring  to  Miletus,  they  there  begged 
the  assistance  of  Aristagoras,  for  the  restoring  of  them  again 
to  their  country.  I  his  Aristagoras  then  governed  that  city  as 
deputy  to  Hestiaeus,  whose  nephew  and  son-in-law  he  was  ; 
Hestiaeus  being  then  absent  at  Susa  in  Persia:  for  Darius, 
on  his  return  to  Sardis,  after  his  unfortunate  expedition 
against  the  Scythians,  being  thorouglily  informed,  that  he 
owed  the  safety  of  himself  and  all  his  army  to  Hestiaeus,  in 
that  he  persuaded  the  lotiiaiis  not  to  desert  him  at  the;  Danube, 
sent  for  him  to  come  to  him,  and  having  acknowledged  his 
service,  bid  him  ask  his  reward  :  whereon  he  desired  of  him 
the  Edonian  Myrcinus,  a  territory  on  the  river  Strymon  in 
Thrace,  in  order  to  build  a  city  there;  and,  having  obtained 
his  request,  immediately  on  his  return  to  Miletus,  he  equip- 
ped a  fleet,  and  sailed  for  Thrace,  and,  having  there  taken 
possession  of  the  territory  granted  him,  did  forthwith  set 
himself  on  the  enterprise  of  building  his  intended  city  in 
the  place  projected."  iVIegab}zus,  being  then  governor  of 
Thrace  for  Darius,  soon  saw  what  danger  this  might  create 
to  the  king's  affairs  in  those  parts:  for  he  considered  that 
the  new-built  city  stood  upon  a  navigable  river;  that  the 
country  thereabout  afforded  abundance  of  timber  for  the 
building  of  ships;  that  it  was  inhabited  by  several  nations 
both  of  Greeks  and  barbarians,  which  could  furnish  a  great 
multitude  of  men  fit  for  military  service  both  by  sea  and 
land;  that  if  these  should  get  such  a  crafty  and  enterprising 
person,  as  Hestiaeus  at  the  head  of  them,  they  might  soon  grow 
to  a  power,  both  by  sea  and  land,  too  hard  for  the  king  to 
master ;  and  that  especially  since,  from  their  silver  and 
gold  mines,  of  which  there  were  many  in  that  country,  they 
might  be  furnished  with  means  enough  to  carry  on  any  en- 
terprise they  should  undertake.  All  this,  on  his  return  to 
Sardis,  he  represented  unto  the  king,  who  being  thereby 
made  fully  sensible  of  the  error  he  had  committed,  for  the 
remedying  of  it  sent  a  messenger  to  Myrcinus  to  call  Hes- 
tiagus  to  Sardis  to  him,  under  pretence,  that  having  great 

n  For,  according  to  the  lowest  valuation,  aa  Attic  talent  of  gold  amounts 
to  three  thousand  pounds  sterling, 
o  Herodotus,  lib.  5. 


296  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART  I» 

matters  in  design,  he  wanted  his  counsel  and  advice  con- 
cerning them,  by  which  means  having  gotten  him  into  his 
power,  he  carried  him  with  him  to  Siisa,  pretending,  that  he 
needed  such  an  able  counsellor  and  so  faithful  a  friend  to  be 
always  about  him,  to  ;idvis(>  with  on  all  occasions  that  might 
happen;  and  that  he  would  make  him  so  far  a  partaker  of 
his  fortunes  by  his  royal  bounty  to  him  in  Persia,  that  he 
should  have  no  reason  any  more  to  think  either  of  Myrcinus 
or  Miletus.  Ileslijeus  hereon  setting  himself  under  a  neces- 
sity of  obeying,  accompanied  Darius  to  Susa,  and  appointed 
Aristagoras  to  govern  at  Miletus  in  his  absence,  and  to  him 
the  banished  Naxiaiis  applied  for  relief.  As  soon  as  Arista- 
goras  understood  from  them  their  case,  he  entertained  a 
design  of  improving  this  opportunity  to  the  making  of  him- 
self master  of  Naxus.  and  therefore  readily  promised  them 
all  the  relief  and  assistance  which  they  desired  :  but  not 
being  strong  enough  of  himself  to  accomplish  what  he  in- 
tended, he  went  to  Sardis.  and  communicated  the  matter  to 
Artaphernes.  telling  him,  that  this  was  an  opportunity  ofifer- 
ed  for  the  putting  of  a  rich  and  fertile  island  into  the  king's 
hands  ;  that  if  he  had  that,  all  the  rest  of  the  Cyclades  would 
of  course  fall  under  his  power  also  ;  and  that  then  Euboea, 
an  island  as  big  as  Cyprus,  lying  next,  would  be  an  easy  con- 
quest, from  wlience  he  would  have  an  open  passage  into 
Greece,  for  the  bringing  of  all  that  country  under  his  obedi- 
ence ;  and  that  one  hundred  ships  would  be  sufficient  to 
accomplish  this  enterprise.  Artaphernes,  on  the  hearing  of 
the  proposal,  was  so  much  pleased  with  it,  that,  instead  of 
one  hundred  ships,  which  Aristagoras  demanded,  he  promised 
him  two  hundred,  provided  the  king  liked  hereof:  and 
accordingly,  on  his  writing  to  him,  having  received  his  an- 
swer of  approbation,  he  sent  him  the  next  spring  to  Miletus, 

the  number  of  ships  which  he  had  promised,  under 
Dariiis^!  the  Command  of  Megabates,  a  noble  Persian  of  the 

Achaemenian  or  royal  family.  But  his  commission 
being  to  obey  the  orders  of  Aristagoras,  and  the  haughty 
Persian  not  brooking  to  be  under  the  command  of  an  Ionian, 
this  created  a  dissension  between  the  two  generals,  which 
was  carried  on  so  far,  that  Megabates,  to  be  revenged  on 
Aristagoras,  betrayed  the  design  to  the  Naxians  :  whereon 
they  provided  so  fully  for  their  defence,  that,  after  the  Per- 
sians had,  in  the  siege  of  the  chief  city  of  the  island,  spent 
four  months,  and  all  their  provisions,  they  were  forced  to 
retire,  for  want  wherewith  there  any  longer  to  subsist,  and 
so  the  whole  plot  miscarried  ;  the  blame  whereof  being,  by 
Megabates,  all  laid  upon  Aristagoras,  and  the  false  accusations 
of  the  one  being  more  favourably  heard  than  the  just  defence 


BOOK  IV.J  THE  OLD  AND  NJIW  TESTAMENTS^  297 

of  the  other,  Artaphernes  charged  on  him  all  the  expenses 
of  the  expedition  :  and  it  was  ijivcn  him  to  understand,  that 
they  would  be  exacted  of  him  to  the  utmost  penny,  which 
being  more  than  he  was  able  to  pay,  he  foresaw  that  this 
must  end  not  only  in  the  loss  of  his  government,  but  also  in 
his  utter  ruin  ;  and  therefore,  being  driven  into  extremities 
by  the  desperateness  of  his  case,  he  entertained  thoughts  of 
rebelling  against  the  king,  as  the  only  way  left  him  for  the 
extricating  of  himself  out  of  this  diliiculty  ;  and  while  he 
bad  this  under  consideration,  came  a  message  to  him  from 
HestiaRus,  which  advised  the  same  thing  ;  for  Hestiaeus,  after 
several  years  continuance  at  the  Persian  court,  being  weary 
of  their  manners,  and  exceedingly  desirous  of  being  again  in 
his  own  country,  sent  this  advice  unto  Aristagoras,  as  the 
likeliest  means  to  accomplish  his  aim  herein;  for  he  conclu- 
ded, that  if  there  were  any  combustions  raised  in  Ionia,  he 
should  easily  prevail  with  Darius  to  send  him  thither  to  ap- 
pease them,  as  it  accordingly  came  to  pass.  Aristagoras 
therefore  finding  his  own  inclinations  backed  with  the  order 
of  Hestiaeus,  communicated  the  matter  to  the  chief  of  the 
lonians,  and  finding  them  all  ready  to  join  with  him  in  what 
he  proposed,  he  fixed  his  resolutions  for  a  revolt,  and  imme- 
diately set  himself  to  make  all  manner  of  preparations  to 
put  them  in  execution. 

The  Tyrians,  after  the  taking  of  their  city  by  Nebuchad- 
nezzar, having  been  reduced  to  a  state  of  servitude,  conti- 
nued under  the  pressure  of  it  full  seventy  years  :  but  thesa 
being  now  expired,  they  were  again,  according  to  the  pro- 
phecy of  Isaiah,P  restored  to  their  former  privileges,  and 
were  allowed  to  have  a  king  again  of  their  own  ;  and  accord- 
ingly had  so  till  the  time  of  Alexander.  This  favour  seems  to 
have  been  granted  them  by  Darius,  in  consideration  of  their 
usefulness  to  him  in  his  naval  wars,  and  especially  at  this 
time  when  he  needed  them  and  their  shipping  so  much  for 
the  reducing  of  the  lonians  again  to  their  obedience  to  him. 
Hereon  they  soon  recovered  their  former  prosperity,  and, 
by  the  means  of  their  traffic,  whereby  they  had  made  their 
city  the  chief  mart  of  all  the  East,  they  soon  grew  to  that 
greatness,  both  of  power  and  riches,  as  enabled  them,  on 
Alexander's  invJiding  the  East,  to  make  a  greater  stand  against 
him  than  all  the  Persian  empire  besides ;  for  they  stopped 
the  progress  of  his  whole  army  full  seven  months,  before  they 
could  be  reduced,  as  will  be  hereafter  shown.  This  grant  was 
made  them  by  Darius  in  the  nineteenth  year  of  his  reign.. 

The  next  year  after,  Aristagoras,  to  engage  the  lonians 

p  Isa.  xsiii.  15,  IT 
VoT-.   J.  ??R 


298  tONNEXION  OF  THE  HrSTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

the  more  firmly  to  stick  to  him,  restored  to  them  all 
D^fus^:  their  liberties  ;'5  for,  beginning  first  with  himself  at 

Miletus,  he  there  abolished  his  own  authority,  and 
reinstated  the  people  in  the  government ;  and  then,  going 
round  Ionia,  forced  all  the  other  tyrants  (as  the  Greeks  then 
called  them)  in  every  city  to  do  the  same  ;  by  which,  having 
united  them  into  one  common  league,  and  gotten  himself  to 
be  made  the  head  of  it,  he  openly  declared  his  revolt  from 
the  king,  and  armed  both  by  sea  and  land  to  make  war 
against  him.  This  was  done  in  the  twentieth  year  of  the 
reign  of  Darius. 

Aristagoras,  to  strengthen  himself  the  more  against  the 

Persians  in  this  war,  which  he  had  begun  against 
Dal^rus^fi  them,  went  in   the  beginning  of  the  following  year 

to  Lacedaemon,  to  engage  that  city  in  his  interest, 
and  gain  their  assistance. ""  But  being  there  rejected,  he 
came  to  Athens,  where  he  had  a  much  more  favourable  re- 
ception :  for  he  had  the  good  fortune  to  come  thither  at  a 
time  when  he  found  the  Athenians  in  a  thorough  disposition 
to  close  with  any  proposal  against  the  Persians  that  should 
be  offered  to  them,  they  being  then  in  the  highest  degree 
exasperated  against  them  on  this  occasion.  Hippias,  the 
son  of  Pisistratus,  tyrant  of  Athens,  having  been  expelled 
thence  about  ten  years  before,  after  he  had  in  vain  tried 
several  other  ways  for  his  restoration,  at  length  applied  him- 
self to  Artaphernes  at  Sardis ;  and,  having  there  insinuated 
himself  a  great  way  into  his  favour,  was  well  heard  in  all 
that  he  had  to  say  against  the  Athenians,  and  he  spared  not 
to  do  all  that  he  could  to  set  Artaphernes  against  them  ; 
which  the  Athenians  having  advice  of,  sent  an  embassy  to 
Sardis,  to  make  friendship  with  Artaphernes,  and  to  desire 
him  not  to  give  ear  to  their  exiles  against  them.  The  an- 
swer which  Artaphernes  gave  them  was,  that  they  must  re- 
ceive Hippias  again,  if  they  would  be  safe.  Which  haughty 
message  being  brought  back  to  Athens,  did  set  the  whole 
city  into  a  rage  against  the  Persians;  and  in  this  juncture 
Aristagoras  coming  thither,  easily  obtained  from  them  al  1 
that  he  desired;  and  accordingly  they  ordered  a  fleet  of 
twenty  ships  for  his  assistance. 

In  the  third  year  of  the  war,  the  Tonians  having  gotten  all 

their  forces  together,  and  being  assisted  with  twenty 
D^us*22   ships  from  Athens,  and  five  from  Eretria,  a  city  in 

the  island  of  Euboea,  they  sailed  to  Ephesus  ;  and 
having  there  laid  up  their  ships,  resolved  on  an  attempt  upon 
Sardis  f  and   accordingly  marched  thither,    and   took   the 

q  Herodotus,  lib.  ?r.  r  HerodoUis.  Hb.  5-  s  Herodotus,  ibid. 


HOOK  IV.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  299 

place.  But  Sardis  being  built  mostly  of  cane,  and  their 
houses  being  therefore  very  combustible,  one  of  them  being 
accidentally  set  on  fire,  did  spread  the  flame  to  all  the  rest, 
and  the  whole  city  was  burned  down,  excepting  only  the 
castle  where  Artaphernes  retired,  and  defended  himself. 
But  after  this  accident,  the  Persians  and  Lydians  gathering 
together  for  their  defence,  and  other  forces  coming  in  to 
their  assistance  from  the  adjacent  parts,  the  lonians  saw  it 
was  time  for  them  to  retreat ;  and  therefore  marched  back 
to  their  ships  at  Ephesus,  with  all  the  speed  they  were  able  ; 
but  before  they  could  reach  the  place,  they  were  overtaken, 
fought  with,  and  overthrown  with  a  great  slaughter.  Whereon 
the  Athenians  going  on  board  their  ships,  hoisted  their  sails, 
and  returned  home,  and  would  not  after  this  be  any  farther 
concerned  in  this  war,  notwithstanding  all  the  most  earnest 
entreaties  with  which  they  were  solicited  to  it  by  Aristagoras. 
However,  their  having  engaged  thus  far,  gave  rise  to  that 
war  between  the  Persians  and  the  Greeks  ;  which,  being 
carried  on  for  several  generations  after  between  these  two 
nations,  caused  infinite  calamities  to  both,  and  at  last  ended 
in  the  utter  destruction  of  the  Persian  empire  ;  for  Darius, 
on  his  hearing  of  the  burning  of  Sardis,  and  the  part  which 
the  Athenians  had  therein,  from  that  time  resolved  on  a  war 
against  Greece ;  and  that  he  might  be  sure  not  to  forget  it, 
he  caused  one  of  his  attendants  every  day,  when  he  sat  at 
dinner,  to  say  aloud  unto  him  three  times,  Sii-e,  remember  the 
Athenians.^  In  the  burning  of  Sardis,  it  happened  that  the 
temple  of  Cybele,  the  goddess  of  the  country,  took  fire,  and 
was  consumed  with  the  rest  of  the  city  ;  which  afterward 
served  the  Persians  for  a  pretence  to  set  on  fire  all  the 
temples  of  the  Grecians  which  came  in  their  way,  though 
in  truth,  that  proceeded  from  another  cause,  which  shall  be 
hereafter  related. 

On  the  departure  of  the  Athenians,  the  rest  of  the  confe- 
derate fleet  sailed  to  the  Hellespont,  and  the  Propontis,  and 
reduced  the  Byzantines,  and  most  of  the  other  Grecian 
cities  in  those  parts  under  their  power  ;"  and  then,  sailing 
back  again,  brought  in  the  Carians  to  join  with  them  in  this 
war,  and  also  the  Cypriots,  who  all  (excepting  the  Amathu- 
sians)  entered  into  the  same  confederacy  against  Darius,  and 
revolted  from  him  ;  which  drawing  upon  them  all  the  forces 
that  the  Persians  had  in  Cilicia,  and  the  other  neighbouring 
provinces,  and  also  a  great  fleet  from  Phojnicia,  the  lonians 
sailed  thither  to  their  assistance  ;  and  engaging  the  Phceni- 

t  Herodotus,  lib.  6.     Cornelius  Nepo;  in  Miltiade 
u  Herodotus,  ibrd". 


360  XiOJJNEXlON'  OP  THE  mSTORY  OP  ['PART  L 

cian  fleet,  gave  them  a  great  overthrow.  But,  at  the  same 
time,  the  Cypriots  being  vanquished  in  a  battle  at  land,  and 
the  head  of  that  conspiracy  slain  in  it,  (he  lonians  lost  the 
whole  fruit  of  their  victory  at  sea,  and  were  forced  to  re- 
turn, without  having  at  all  benefited  either  themselves  or 
their  allies  by  it;  for  after  this  defeat  at  land,  the  whole 
island  was  again  reduced  ;  and  within  three  years  after,  the 
same  persons  whom  they  had  now  assisted  came  against  them 
with  their  ships,  in  conjunction  with  the  rest  of  the  Persian 
fleet,  to  complete  their  utter  destruction. 

The  next  year  after,  being  the  twenty-third  of  Darius, 
Daurises,  Hymees,  and  Otancs,  three  Persian  gene- 
»trlus^^"  r^^'s,  and  all  sons-in-law  of  Darius  by  the  marriage  of 
his  daughters,  having  divided  the  Persian  forces  be- 
tween them,  marched  three  several  ways  to  attack  the  revolt- 
ers.^  Daurises  with  his  army  directed  his  course  to  the 
Hellespont ;  but,  after  having  tl^ere  reduced  several  of  the 
revolted  cities,  on  his  hearing  that  the  Carian?  had  also 
joined  the  confederates,  he  left  those  parts,  and  marched 
with  all  his  forces  against  them.  Whereon  Hymees,  who  was 
first  sent  to  the  Propontis,  after  having  taken  the  city  of 
Cyus  in  Mysia,  marched  thence  to  supply  his  place  on  the 
Hellespont,  where  there  was  much  more  need  of  him,  and 
there  reduced  all  the  llian  coast;  but  falling  sick  at  Troas 
he  there  died  the  next  year  after.  Artaphernes  and  Otanes 
with  the  third  army,  resolving  to  strike  at  the  very  heart  of 
the  confederacy,  fell  into  Ionia  and  jEolia,  where  the  chief 
of  their  strength  lay,  and  took  Clazomenae  in  Ionia,  and 
Cyma  in  ^Eolia ;  which  was  such  a  blow  to  the  whole  confede- 
racy, that  Aristagoras  hereon,  despairing  of  his  cause,  re- 
solved to  leave  Miletus,  and  shift  elsewhere  for  liis  safety; 
and  therefore,  getting  together  all  that  were  willing  to  ac- 
company him,  he  went  on  shipboard,  and  set  sail  for  the  river 
Strymon  in  Thrace,  and  there  seized  on  the  territory  of  ^]yr- 
cinus,  which  Darius  had  formerly  given  to  Hestiasus ;  but  the 
next  year  after,  while  he  besieged  the  city,  he  was  there 
slain  by  the  Thracians,  and  all  his  army  cut  in  pieces. 

In   the    twenty-fourth  year  of    Darius,    Daurises  having 

fallen   into   the    country  of  the  Carians,  overthrew 

Darius^24.  them  in  two  battles  with  a  very  great  slaughter  ;  but, 

in  a   third  battle,  being  drawn  into  an  ambush,  he 

was  slain,  with  several  other  eminent  Persians,  and  his  whole 

army  cut  off  and  destroyed. >' 

Artaphernes,   with  Otanes,  and  the  rest  of  the  Persian 

X  fTerodbtuF,  lib. -^  v  Herocfotiis,  lib.  5. 


BOOK  IV.J  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  301 

generals,  seeing  that  Miletus  was  the  head  and 
chief  strength  of  the  Ionian  confederacy,  resolved  ylri\>s2n. 
to  bend  all  their  force  against  it,  reckoning,  that,  if 
they  could  make  themselves  masters  of  this  city,  all  the  rest 
would  fall  of  course.^  The  lonians,  being  informed  of  this, 
agreed,  in  their  general  council,  to  bring  no  army  into  the 
field,  but  provide  and  strengthen  Miletus  as  well  as  they 
could  for  a  siege,  and  to  draw  all  their  forces  to  tjght  the  Per- 
sians by  sea  ;  in  which  sort  of  fighting  they  thought  them- 
selves, by  reason  of  their  skill  in  maritime  atlairs,  most  likely 
to  prevail  :  in  order  whereto,  they  appointed  Lada,  a  small 
island  before  Miletus,  for  their  rendezvous  ;  and  thither  they 
came,  to  the  number  of  three  hundred  and  tifty-three  ships  : 
at  th€  sight  of  which,  the  Persians,  though  their  fleet  was 
double  the  number,  fearing  the  event,  came  not  to  a  battle 
with  them,  till  they  had,  by  their  emissaries  sent  among  them, 
corrupted  the  major  part  to  desert  the  cause  ;  so  that,  when 
they  came  to  engage,  the  Samians,  Lesbians,  and  several 
others,  hoisting  their  sails,  and  departing  home,  there  were 
not  above  one  hundred  ships^  left  to  bear  the  whole  brunt  of 
the  day;  who  being  soon  overborne  by  the  number  of  the 
enemy,  were  almost  all  lost  and  destroyed.  After  this  Mile- 
tus, being  besieged  both  by  sea  and  land,  soon  fell  a  prey  into 
the  hands  of  the  victors,  who  absolutely  destroyed  the  place; 
which  happened  in  the  sixth  year  after  the  revolt  of  Arista- 
goras.  From  Miletus  the  Persians  marched  into  Caria,  and 
having  there  taken  some  cities  by  force,  and  received  others 
by  voluntary  submission,  in  a  short  time  reduced  all  that 
country  again  under  their  former  yoke.  The  Milesians  who 
were  saved  from  the  sword  in  the  taking  of  the  city,  being 
sent  captives  to  Darius  to  Susa,  he  did  them  no  farther  harm, 
but  sent  them  to  inhabit  the  city  of  Ampha,  which  was 
situated  at  the  mouth  of  the  Tigris,  where,  in  conjunction 
with  the  Euphrates,  it  falls  into  the  Persian  gulf,  not  far  from 
the  place  where  now  the  city  Balsora  stands ;  and  there  they 
continued  a  Grecian  colony  for  many  ages  after. 

After  the  taking  of  Miletus,  the  Persian  fleet,  which  mostly- 
consisted  of  Phoenicians,  Cypriots,  and  Egyptians, 
having  wintered  on  the  coasts  thereabout,  the  next  oaHus^le', 
year  took  in  Samos,  Chios,  Lesbos,  and  the  rest  of 
the  islands  ;  and,  while  they  were  thus  employed  at  sea,  the 
armies  at  land  fell  on  the  cities  of  the  continent  ;  and,  having 
brought  them  all  again  under  their  power,  they  treated  them 
as  they  had  afore  threatened,  that  is,  they  made  all  the  beau- 
tjfulest  of  their  youths  eunuchs,  sent  all  their  virgins  into 

a  Herodotus,  lib.  6' 


,302  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OP  [PART  X^ 

Persia,  and  burned  all  their  cities,  with  their  temples  ;  into 
so  grievous  a  calamity  were  they  brought  by  this  revolt,which 
the  self-designs  of  one  enterprising  busy-headed  man,  Has- 
tiasus,  the  Milesian,  led  them  into;  and  he  himself  had  his 
share  in  it;  for  this  very  year,  being  taken  prisoner  by  the 
Persians,  he  was  carried  to  Sardis,  and  their  crucified,  by  the 
order  of  Arlaphcrnes.''  He  hastened  his  execution,  without 
consulting  Darius  about  it,  lest  his  kindness  for  him  might  ex- 
tend to  tiie  granting  him  his  pardon,  and  thereby  a  dangerous 
enemy  to  the  Persians  be  again  let  loose  to  embarrass  their 
affairs.  And  that  it  would  have  so  happened  as  they  con- 
jectured, did  afterward  appear:  for  when  his  head  was 
brought  to  Darius,  he  expressed  great  displeasure  against  the 
authors  of  his  death,  and  caused  his  head  to  be  honourably 
buried  ;  as  the  remains  of  a  man  that  had  merited  much  from 
him.  How  he  was  the  cause  of  the  loiiion  war,  and  what  was 
his  aim  herein,  hath  been  above  related-  On  the  breaking 
out  of  that  revolt,  and  the  burning  of  Sardis,  Darius,  under- 
standing that  Aristagoras,  the  deptuty  of  Hestiajus,  was  at 
the  head  of  it,  doubted  not  but  that  Hestiaeus  himself  was  at 
the  bottom  of  the  whole  contrivance,  and  therefore  sent  for 
him,  and  charged  him  with  it :  but  he  managed  the  matter  so 
craftily  with  Darius,  as  to  make  him  believe,  not  only  that  he 
was  innocent,  but  that  the  whole  cause  of  this  revolt  was, 
that  he  was  not  there  to  have  hindered  it:  for  he  told  him, 
that  the  matter  appeared  plainly  to  have  been  long  brewing  ; 
that  they  had  waited  only  for  his  absence  to  put  it  in  execu- 
tion ;  that,  if  he  had  continued  at  Miletus,  it  could  never 
have  happened  ;  and  that  the  only  way  to  restore  his  affairs 
in  those  parts  was  to  send  him  thither  to  appease  these  com- 
bustions ;  which  he  promised  not  only  to  do,  but  to  deliver 
Aristagoras  into  his  hands,  and  make  the  great  island  of  Sar- 
dinia to  become  tributary  to  him  ;  swearing,  that,  if  he  were 
sent  on  this  voyage,  he  would  not  change  his  garments  till  all 
were  effected  that  he  had  said.*"  By  which  fair  speech  Da- 
rius being  deceived,*^  gave  him  permission  to  return  into  Ionia. 
On  his  arrival  at  Sardis,  his  busy  head  set  him  at  work  to 
contrive  a  plot  against  the  goverimient  there,  and  he  had 
drawn  several  of  the  Persians  into  it:  but  in  some  discourse 
which  he  had  with  Artaphernes,  finding  that  he  was  no 
stranger  to  the  part  which  he  had  acted  in  the  Ionian  revolt, 
he  thought  it  not  safe  for  him  any  longer  to  tarry  at  Sardis  ; 
and  therefore,  the  next  night  after  getting  privately  away,  he 
fled  to  the  seacoast,  and  got  over  to  the  island  of  Chios. 

a  Herodotus,  lib.  6.  b  Herodotus,  lib.  5> 

c  Herodotus,  lib.  6: 


BOOK  IV.]  THE  OLD  AND  KEW  TESTAMENTS.  303 

But  the  Chians,  mistrusting  that  his  coming  thither  was  to  act 
some  part  for  the  interest  of  Darius  among  them,  seized  on  his 
person,  and  put  him  in  prison  ;  but  afterward,  being  satisfied 
how  he  was  engaged  to  the  contrary,  they  set  him  again  at 
liberty.  Hereon  he  sent  one  whom  he  had  confidence  in, 
with  letters  to  Sardis,  to  those  Persians  whom  he  had  cor- 
rupted while  he  was  there  ;  but  the  person  whom  he  trusted 
deceiving  him,  dehvered  the  liters  to  Artaphernes  ;  whereby 
the  plot  being  discovered,  and  all  the  persons  concerned  in  it 
put  to  death,  he  failed  of  this  design.  But  thinking  still  he 
could  do  great  matters,  were  he  at  the  head  of  the  Ionian 
league,  in  order  to  the  gaining  of  this  point,  he  got  the 
Chians  to  convey  him  to  Miletus.  But  the  Milesians,  having 
had  their  liberty  restored  to  them  by  Aristagoras,  would  by  no 
means  run  the  hazard  of  losing  it  again,  by  receiving  him  into 
the  city  :  whereon  endeavouring  in  the  night  to  enter  by  force, 
he  was  repulsed,  and  wounded,  and  thereby  forced  to  return 
again  to  Chios.  While  he  was  there,  being  asked  the  reason 
why  he  so  earnestly  pressed  Aristagoras  to  revolt,  and  there- 
by brought  so  great  a  calamity  upon  Ionia,  he  told  them,  it 
was  because  the  king  had  resolved  to  remove  the  lonians  into 
Phoenicia,  and  to  bring  the  Phoenicians  into  Ionia,  and  give 
them  that  country  ;  which  was  wholly  a  fiction  of  his  own 
devising  ;  for  Darius  had  never  any  such  intention  ;  but  it 
very  well  served  his  purpose,  first  to  excuse  himself,  and  next 
to  excite  the  lonians  with  the  greater  firmness  and  vigour  to 
prosecute  the  war;  which  accordingly  had  its  effect :  for  the 
lonians,  hearing  that  their  country  was  to  betaken  from  them, 
and  given  to  the  Phoenicians,  were  exceedingly  alarmed  at  it; 
and  therefore  resolved,  with  the  utmost  of  their  power,  to 
stand  to  theirdefence.  However,  Hestiaeus  finding  the  Chians 
not  any  way  inclined  to  trust  him  with  any  of  their  naval 
forces,  as  he  desired  of  them,  he  passed  over  to  the  isle  of 
Lesbos  ;  and,  having  there  gained  eight  ships,  he  sailed  with 
them  to  Byzantium,  where,  making  prize  of  all  the  ships  that 
past  the  Bosphorus,  either  to  or  from  the  Euxine  s^a,  except- 
ing only  such  as  belonged  to  those  who  were  confederated 
with  him,  he  did  there,  in  a  short  time,  grow  to  a  great  powers 
But,  on  his  hearing  of  the  taking  of  Miletus,  he  left  the  con- 
duct of  his  affairs  in  those  parts  to  a  deputy,  and  sailed  to 
Chios  ;  and,  after  some  little  opposition  at  his  first  landing, 
made  himself  master  of  the  island,  the  Chians,  by  reason  of 
the  loss  they  had  lately  sustained  in  the  sea-fight  against  the 
Persians  at  Lada,  being  too  weak  at  that  time  to  resist  him<. 
From  thence  he  sailed  with  a  great  army  of  lonians  and 
j^olians  to  Thasus,  an  island  on  the  Thracian  coast,  and  laid 
?iege  to  the  chief  city  of  that  Island  :  but  hearing  that  the 


3d4  CONNEXION   OF  THE  HISTORV    OF  [pART  Jr 

Pliocnician  fleet,  in  the  service  of  the  Persians,  had  sailed  to 
take  in  the  islands  on  tlie  Asian  coast,  he  raised  the  siege,  and 
sailed  back  to  Lesbos  with  all  his  forces,  to  defend  that  place ; 
from  whence  passing  over  into  the  continent  which  was  op- 
posite to  it;  to  plunder  the  country,  Herpagus,  one  of  the 
Persian  generals,  who  happened  then  to  he  therewith  a  great 
army,  fell  upon  him  ;  and,  having  routed  his  forces,  and  taken 
him  prisoner,  sent  him  to  Sarchs,  where  he  met  with  the  fate 
which  I  have  mentioned.  He  was  a  man  of  the  best  head,  and 
the  most  enterprising  genius  of  any  of  his  age  ;  but  he  having 
wholly  employed  these  abilities  to  lay  plots  and  designs, which 
produced  great  mischief  in  the  world,  for  the  obtaining  of 
little  aims  of  his  own,  it  happened  to  him,  as  most  at  the  end 
it  doth  to  such  refined  polilicians,  who,  while  they  arc  spin- 
ning tine  webs  of  politics  for  the  bringing  about  of  their  self- 
designs,  often  find  them  to  become  snares  to  their  own  des- 
truction; for  the  providence  of  the  wisest  of  men  being  too 
short  to  overreach  the  providence  of  God,  he  often  permits 
-such  Ahithophels,  for  the  punishment  of  their  presumption, 
as  well  as  their  malice,  to  perish  by  their  own  devices.  And 
so  it  happened  to  Machiavel,  the  famous  master  of  our 
modern  politicians,  who,  after  all  his  politics,  died  in  jail  for 
want  of  bread.  And  thus  may  it  happen  to  all  else,  who 
make  any  other  maxims  than  those  of  truth  and  justice  to  be 
the  rules  of  their  politics. 

After  the  Phoenician  fleet  had  subdued  all  the  Islands  on 
the  Asian  coast,  Artaphernes  sent  them  to  reduce 
i)arius27'.  ^hc  Hellespont,  that  is,  all  its  coasts  on  the  Europe- 
an side,  for  those  on  the  Asian  had  been  already 
brought  under  by  the  armies  at  land  :'^  which  Miltiades, 
prince  of  the  Thracian  Chersonesus,  having  advice  of,  and 
that  the  fleet  was  come  as  far  as  Tenedos  to  put  these 
orders  in  execution,  he  thought  not  fit  to  tarry  their  arri- 
val, as  being  too  weak  to  resist  so  great  a  power  ;  but  im- 
mediately carried  all  that  he  had  on  board  five  ships,  and 
set  sail  with  them  for  Athens.  But,  in  his  passage,  one  of 
them,  commanded  by  Metiochus,  his  eldest  son,  was  taken 
by  the  Phoenicians,  and  Metiochus  was  carried  to  Darius  to 
Susa  ;  but,  instead  of  doing  him  any  hurt,  he  generously 
gave  him  an  house,  and  lands  also  for  his  maintenance,  and 
married  him  to  a  Persian  lady,  with  whom  he  there  lived  in 
an  honourable  state  all  his  life  after,  and  never  more  return- 
ed into  Greece.  In  the  interim  Miltiades,  with  his  other 
four  ships,  got  safe  to  Athens,  and  there  again  settled  him- 
self; for  he  was  a  citizen  of  that  city,  and  of  one  of  the 

d  Herodotus,  lib.  6,    Cornelius  Nepos  in  Miltradf  - 


iiOOK  IV.J  THE'  OLD  A\J>  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  306 

most  honourable  families  in  it.  Miltiades,  his  father,  Cimon's 
elder  brother  by  the  same  mother,  (for  they  had  dilFerent 
fathers,)  was  the  first  of  the  Athenians  that  settled  in  the 
Thracian  Chersonesus,  being  called  thither  by  the  Dolonces, 
the  inhabitants  of  the  country,  to  be  their  prince,  who,  dy- 
ing without  issue,  left  his  principality  to  Stesagoras,  his  ne- 
phew, the  eldest  son  of  his  brother  Cimon  ;  he  dying  also 
without  children,  the  sons  of  Pisistratus,  who  then  governed 
at  Athens,  sent  this  Miltiades'sbrother  thither  to  succeed  him; 
where  he  arrived,  and  settled  himself  in  that  year  in  which 
Darius  entered  on  his  war  against  the  Scythians,  in  which 
expedition  he  accompanied  him  with  his  ships  to  the  Danube, 
as  hath  been  above  said.  Three  years  after  he  was  driven 
out  by  the  Scythians  ;  but  being  afterward  brought  back,  and 
restored  again  by  the  Dolonces,  he  continued  there  till  this 
time,  and  then  was  finally  dispossessed  by  the  Phoenicians. 
While  he  lived  in  the  Chersonesus,  he  married,  for  his  second 
wife,  Hegesipyla,  the  daughter  of  Olorus,  a  Thracian  king 
in  the  neighbourhood,  by  whom  he  had  Cimoh,  the  famous 
general  of  the  Athenians.®  After  the  death  of  Miltiades,  she 
had,  by  a  second  husband,  a  son  called  also  Olorus,  by  the 
name  of  his  grandfather,  who  was  the  father  of  Thucydides 
the  historian.  She  could  not  have  had  them  both  by  the 
same  husband;  for  Cimon  and  Thucydides,  and  consequently 
Olorus,  were  of  two  different  tribes,  and  therefore  they  could 
not  be  both  descended  from  Miltiades. 

Darius,  recalling  all  his  other  generals,  sent  Mardonius, 
the  son  of  Gobrias,  a  young  Persian  nobleman,  who 
had  lately  married  one  of  his  daughters,  to  be  the  oariuf28. 
chief  commander  in  all  the  maritime  parts  of  Asia, 
with  orders  to  invade  Greece,  and  revenge  him  on  the 
Athenians  and  Eretrians  for  the  burning  of  Sardis.  On  his 
arrival  at  the  Hellespont,  all  his  forces  being  there  rendez- 
voused for  the  execution  of  these  orders,  he  marched  with 
his  land  forces  through  Thrace,  into  Macedonia,  ordering 
his  fleet  first  to  take  in  Thasus,  and  then  follow  after  him, 
and  coast  it  by  sea,  as  he  marched  by  land,  that  each  might 
be  at  hand  to  act  in  concert  with  each  other,  for  the  prose- 
cuting of  the  end  proposed  by  this  war.  On  his  arrival  in 
Macedonia,  all  that  country  dreading  so  great  a  power,  sub- 
mitted to  him.  But  the  fleet,  after  they  had  subdued  Thasus, 
as  they  were  passing  farther  on  towards  the  coasts  of  Mace- 
donia, on  their  doubling  of  the  cape  of  Mount  Athos,  now- 
called  Capo  Santo,  met  there  with  a  terrible  storm,  which 
destroyed  three  hundred  of  their  ships,  and  above  twenty/ 

ft  Plutacchua  in  Cimone 
Vot.L  39 


306  flONNEXlON  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  !>■ 

thousand  of  their  men.  And  at  the  same  time  Mardoniuj 
fell  into  no  less  a  misfortune  by  land  :  for  lying  with  his 
army  in  an  encampment  not  sufficiently  secured,  the  Thra- 
cians  took  the  advantaj^e  of  it,  and  falling  on  him  in  the 
night,  broke  into  his  camp,  and  slew  a  great  number  of  his 
men,  and  wounded  Mardonius  himself;  by  which  losses  be- 
ino-  disabled  for  any  farther  action  either  by  sea  or  land,  he 
was  forced  to  march  back  again  into  Asia,  without  gaining 
any  honour  or  advantage,  either  to  himself,  or  the  king's  af- 
fairs, by  this  expedition/ 

Darius,  before  he  would  make  any  further  attempt  upon 
the  Grecians,  to  make  trial  which  of  them  would  sub- 
riariufii).  »"'*^  ^°  '^''^'  ^"^  which  would  not,  sent  heralds  to  all 
their  cities,  to  demand'  earth  and  water  ;  which  was 
the  form  whereby  the  Persians  used  to  require  the  submis- 
sion of  those  whom  they  would  have  yield  to  them.  On  the 
arrival  of  these  heralds,  several  of  the  Grecian  cities,  dread- 
ing the  power  of  the  Persians,  did  as  was  required  of  them. 
But  when  those  who  were  sent  to  Athens  and  Lacedsemon 
came  thither  with  this  commission,  they  flung  them,  the  one 
into  a  well,  and  the  other  into  a  deep  pit,  and  bid  them  fetch 
earth  and  water  thence.  But  this  being  done  in  the  heat  of 
their  rage,  they  repented  of  it,  when  come  to  a  cooler  tem- 
per ;  for  thus  to  put  heralds  to  death,  was  a  violation  of  the  law 
of  nations,  for  which  they  were  afterward  condemned  even 
by  themselves,  as  well  as  all  their  neighbours,  and  would 
ffladly  have  made  any  satisfaction  for  the  wrong,  that  would 
have  been  accepted  of;  and  the  Lacedaemonians  sent  a  per- 
son of  purpose  to  Susa  to  make  an  offer  hereof.^ 

Darius,  on  the  hearing  of  the  ill  success  of  Mardonius, 
suspecting  the  sufficiency  of  his  conduct,  recalled  him 
^riusso.  fi'om  his  comm.and,  and  sent  two  other  generals  in 
his  stead  to  prosecute  the  war  against  the  Grecians, 
Datis  a  Median,  and  Artaphernes  a  Persian,  the  son  of  that 
Artaphernes's  brother,  who  was  lately  governor  at  Sardis, 
and  gave  them  particularly  in  charge  not  to  fail  of  executing 
his  revenge  on  the  Athenians,  and  the  Eretrians,  whom  he 
could  never  forgive  for  the  part  which  they  had  in  the 
burning  of  Sardis.  On  their  arrival  on  the  coasts  of  Ionia, 
they  there  drew  together  an  army  of  three  hundred  thou- 
sand men,  and  a  fleet  of  six  hundred  ships,  and  made  the 
best  preparations  they  could  for  this  expedition  against  the 
Grecians.'' 

In  the  beginning  of  the  next  spring,  the  two  Persian  gene- 

f  Horodotus,  lib.  6.  g  Horodotus,  lib.  7. 

h  Herodotus,  lib.  6.    Plutarchus  in  Aristide.  Cornelius  Neposin  Miltiadt 


BOOK  IV. 1     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  3G7 

rals  having  shipped  their  army,  rendezvoused  their 
whole  fleet  at  Samos,  and  from  thence  sailed  to  Nax-  uarmt^si. 
us;  and,  having  there  burned  the  chief  city  of  the 
island,  and  all  their  temples,  and  taken  in  all  the  other  islands 
in  those  seas,  they  shaped  their  course  directly  for  Eretria  ; 
and,  after  a  siege  of  seven  days,  took  the  city  by  the  treachery 
of  some  of  its  chief  inhabitants,  and  burned  it  to  the  ground, 
making  all  that  they  found  in  it  captives.*  And  then  passing 
over  into  Attica,  they  were  led,  by  the  guidance  of  Hippias,  the 
late  tyrantof  Athens,  into  the  plain  of  Marathon  ;  where  being 
met  and  fought  with  by  ten  thousand  Athenians,  and  one  thou- 
sand Plateans,  under  the  leading  of  Miltiades,  who  was  late- 
ly prince  of  the  Thracian  Chersonesus,  they  were  there  over- 
thrown by  this  small  number  with  a  great  slaughter,  and 
forced  to  retreat  to  their  ships,  and  sail  back  agj^n  into  Asia 
with  baffle  and  disgrace,  having  lost  in  this  expedition,'^  saith 
Trogus,  by  the  sword,  shipwreck,  and  other  ways,  two  hun- 
dred thousand  men.  But  Herodotus  tells  us,^  they  were  no 
more  than  six  thousand  four  hundred  that  were  slain  in  the 
field  of  battle  ;  of  which  Hippias  was  one,  who  was  the  chief 
exciter  and  conductor  of  this  war. 

Datis  and  Artaphernes,  on  their  return  into  Asia,  that  they 
might  show  some  fruit  of  this  expedition,  sent  the  Eretrians 
they  had  taken  to  Darius  to  Susa  ;  who,  without  doing  them 
any  farther  harm,  sent  them  to  dwell  in  a  village  of  the 
region  of  Cissia,  which  was  at  the  distance  of  about  a  day's 
journey  from  Susa,""  where  Apollonius  Tyaneus  found  their 
descendants  still  remaining,  a  great  many  ages  after." 

Darius,  on  his  hearing  of  the  unsuccessful  return  of  his 
forces  from  Attica,  instead  of  being  discouraged  by 
that  or  the  other  disasters  that  had   happened   unto  '^aiiafai 
him  in  his  attempts  upon  the  Grecians,  added  the  de- 
feat of  Marathon  to  the  burning  of  Sardis  as  a  new  cause 
to  excite  him  with  the  greater  vigour  to  carry  on  the   war 
against  them.°     And  therefore,  resolving  in  person  to  make 
an  invasion  upon  theTn  with  all  his  power,  he  sent  orders 
through  all  the  provinces,  to  arm  the  whole  empire  for  it. 
But,  after  three  years  had  been  spent  in  making  these  prepa- 
rations, a  new  war  broke  out  in  the  fourth  by  the  re- 
volt of  the  Egyptians.      But  Darius's  heart  was  so  D\"iassl'. 
earnestly  set  against  the<jirecians,  that  resolvine;  his 
new  rebels  should  not  divert  him  from  executing  his  wrath 
upon   his  old  enemies,  he  determined  to   make  war  against 

i  Herodotus,  lib.  G.     Plutarchus  in   Aristide  et  Tlicmistocle.     Cornelius 
Nepos  in  Miltiade. 

k  Justin,  lib.  2,  c.  9.  1  Herodotus,  lib.  6.  •  m  Ibid 

n  Philoslratus,  lib.  1;  c.  17.        o  Herodotn.«,  lib.  7. 


308  CONNEXION  OV  THE  HISTORY  OP  [pART  J. 

them  both  at  the  same  time;  and  that,  while  part  of  his  for- 
ces were  sent  to  reduce  Egypt,  he  would  in  person  with  the 
rest  fall  upon  Greece.  But  he  being  now  an  old  man,  and 
there  being  a  controversy  between  two  of  hi?  sons,  to  which 
of  the  two  the  succession  did  belong,  it  was  thought  con- 
venient, that  the  matter  should  be  determined  before  he  set 
out  on  this  expedition,  lest  otherwise,  on  his  death,  it  might 
cause  a  civil  war  in  the  empire  ;  for  the  preventing  of  which 
it  was  an  ancient  usage  among  the  Persians,  that,  before 
their  king  went  out  to  any  dangerous  war,  his  successor 
should  be  declared.  The  matter  in  dispute  stood  thus.P 
Darius  had  three  sons  by  his  first  wife,  the  daughter  of  Go- 
brias,  all  born  before  his  advancement  to  the  throne,  and 
four  others  by  Atossa,  the  daughter  of  Cyrus,  who  were  all 
born  after  it.  Of  the  first,  Artabasanes  (who  is  by  some 
called  Artemines,  and  by  others  Ariamenes)  was  the  eldest, 
and  of  the  latter  Xerxes.  Artabasanes  urged  that  he  was 
the  eldest  son :  and  therefore,  according  to  the  usage  and 
custom  of  all  nations,  he  ought  to  be  preferred  in  the  suc- 
cession before  the  younger.  To  this  Xerxes  replied,  that  he 
was  the  son  of  Darius  by  Atossa,  the  daughter  of  Cyrus, 
who  v;as  the  first  founder  of  the  Persian  empire  ;  and  (iiere- 
fore  claimed  in  her  rigli^  to  succeed  his  father  in  it ;  and  that 
it  was  much  more  agreeable  to  justice,  that  the  crown  of 
Cyrus  should  come  to  a  descendant  of  Cyrus,  than  to  one 
who  was  not.  And  he  farther  added,  that  it  was  true,  Arta- 
basanes was  the  eldest  son  of  Darius  ;  but  that  he  was  the 
eldest  son  of  the  king  :  for  Artabasanes  was  born  while  his 
father  was  only  a  private  person,  and  therefore  by  that  pri- 
mogeniture could  claim  no  more  than  to  be  heir  to  his  private 
fortunes  :  but  as  to  him,  he  was  the  first-born  after  his  father 
was  king,  and  therefore  had  the  best  right  to  succeed  him  in 
the  kingdom.  And  for  this  he  had  an  instance  from  the 
Lacedaemonians,  with  whom  it  was  the  usage,  that  the  sons 
of  their  kings,  who  were  born  after  their  advancement  to  the 
throne,  should  succeed  before  those ^vho  were  born  before 
it.  And  this  last  argument  he  was  helped  to  by  Damaratus, 
formerly  king  of  Laced?emon,  who,  having  been  unjustly  de- 
posed by  his  subjects,  was  then  an  exile  in  the  Persian  court. 
Hereupon  Xerxes  was  declared  the  successor,  though  not  so 
much  by  the  strength  of  his  pica,  As  by  the  influence  which 
his  mother  Atossa  had  over  the  inclinations  of  Darius,  who 
was  absolutely  governed  in  this  matter  b^  the  authority  she 
had  with  him.     That  which  wr.s  most  remarkable  in  this  con- 


p  Herodotus,  lib.  7.    Justin,  lili.  2.  c.  19.     Pliilarchos  in  -Arfaxerxe  el  in 
Apophthegm,  mci c/>:"f«^*/a^ 


BOOK  IV.}        THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS-        309 

test  was,  the  friendly  and  amicable  manner  with  which  it  was 
managed  :  for,  during  the  whole  time  that  it  lasted,  all  the 
marks  of  a  most  entire  fraternal  affection  passed  between  the 
two  brothers  ;  and,  when  it  was  decided,  as  the  one  did  not 
insult,  so  neither  did  the  other  repine,  or  express  any  anger 
or  discontent  on  the  judgment  given  ;  and  although  the  elder 
brother  losl  the  cause,  yet  he  cheerfully  submitted  to  the  de- 
termination, wished  his  brother  joy,  and,  without  diminishing 
his  friendship  or  affection  to  him,  ever  after  adhered  to  his 
interest,  and  at  last  died  in  his  service,  being  slain  lighting  for 
him  in  the  Grecian  war;  which  is  an  example  very  rarely 
to  be  met  with,  where  so  great  a  prize  is  at  stake  as  that  of  a 
crown  ;  the  ambitious  desire  of  which  is  usually  of  that  force 
with. the  most  of  mankind  as  to  make  them  break  through  all 
other  considerations  whatsoever,  where  there  is  any  the  least 
pretence  to  it,  to  reach  the  attainment. 

After  the  succession  was  thus  settled,  and  all  were  ready 
to  set  out  both  for  the  Egyptian,  as  well  as  the  Grecian  war, 
Darius  fell  sick  and  died,  in  the  second  year  after  the  Egyp- 
tian revolt,i  having  then  reigned  thirty-six  years;''  and 
Xerxes,  according  to  the  late  determination,  quietly  Dariu^s^se, 
succeeded  in  the  throne.  There  are  writers,^  who 
place  this  determination  after  the  death  of  Darius,  and  say, 
that  it  v/as  settled  by  the  judgment  of  Artabanus,  uncle  to 
the  two  contending  princes,  who  was  made  the  arbitrator 
between  them  in  this  contest.  But  Herodotus,  who  lived 
the  nearest  those  times  of  all  that  have  written  of  it,  posi- 
tively tells  us,  that  it  was  decided  by  Darius  himself  a  little 
before  his  death.  And  his  decision  being  that  which  was 
most  likely  to  have  the  greatest  authority  in  this  matter,  He- 
rodotus's  account  of  it  seemeth  the  much  more  probable  of 
the  two. 

Darius  was  a  prince  of  wisdom,  clemency,  and  justice, 
and  hath  the  honour  to  have  his  name  recorded  in  holy 
writ,*  for  a  favourer  of  God's  people,  a  restorer  of  his  temple 
at  Jerusalem,  and  a  promoter  of  his  worship  therein  :  for  all 
which,  God  was  pleased  to  make  him  his  instrument :  and 
in  respect  hereof,  I  doubt  not,  it  was,  that  he  blessed  him 
with  a  numerous  issue,  a  long  reign,  and  great  prosperity; 
for  although  he  were  not  altogether  so  fortunate  in  his  wars 
against  the  Scythians  and  the  Grecians,  yet  every  where  else 
he  had  full  success  in  all  his  undertakings,  and  not  only 
restored   and  thoroughly  settled  the  empire  of  Cyrus,  after 

q  Herodotus  lib.  7.  r  Ptolem.  in  Canone,  Africanus,  Euseb.  kc, 

s  Justin,  lib.  2,  c.  10.     Plutarchus  Trtpi  <j>/Aat«r£Xf/oc. 

t  Ezrav.  and  in  the  prophecies  of  Haggai  and  Zeehariali. 


310  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

it  had  been  much  shaken  by  Cambyses  and  the  Magian,  but 
also  added  many  large  and  rich  provinces  to  it,  especially 
those  of  India,  Thrace,  Macedon,  and  the  isles  of  the  Ionian 
sea. 

The  Jews  have  a  tradition."  that  in  the  last  year  of  Darius 
died  the  prophets  Haggai,  Zechariah,  and  Malachi ;  that 
thereon  ceased  the  spirit  of  prophecy  from  among  the  chil- 
dren of  Israel :  and  that  this  was  the  obsigillation  or  sealing 
up  of  vision  and  prophecy  spoken  of  by  the  prophet  Daniel.'' 
And  from  the  same  tradition,  they  tell  us,  that  the  kingdom 
of  the  Persians  ceased  also  the  same  year;  for  they  will 
have  it,  that  this  was  the  Darius  whom  Alexander  conquer- 
ed ;  and  that  the  whole  continuance  of  the  Persian  empire 
was  only  fifty-two  years ;  which  they  reckon  thus :  Darius 
the  Median  reigned  one  year,  Cyrus  three  years,  Cambyses 
(who  they  say  was  the  Ahasuerus  who  married  Esther)  six- 
teen years,  and  Darius  (whom  they  will  have  to  be  the  son 
of  Esther)  thirty-two  years.  And  this  last  Darius,  according 
to  them,  was  the  Artaxerxes  who  sent  Ezra  and  Nehemiah 
to  Jerusalem,  to  restore  the  state  of  the  Jews  ;  for  they  tell 
us,  that  Artaxerxes,  among  the  Persians,  was  the  common 
name  of  their  kings,  as  that  of  Pharaoh  was  among  the 
Egyptians.  This  shows  how  ill  they  have  been  acquainted 
with  the  atiliirs  of  the  Persian  empire.  And  their  country- 
man Josephus,  in  the  account  which  he  gives  of  those  times, 
seems  to  have  been  but  very  little  better  informed  concern- 
ing them. 

In  the  time  of. his  reign  firsts  appeared  in  Persia  the  fa- 
mous prophet  of  the  IMagians,  whom  the  Persians  call  Zer- 
dusht,  or  Zaratush,  and  the  Greeks,  Zoroastres.  The  Greek 
and  Latin  writers  much  differ  about  him,  some  of  them  will 
have  it,  that  he  lived  many  ages  before,  and  was  king  of 
Bactria,^  and  others  that  there  were  several  of  the  ifame, 
who  lived  in  several  ages,  all  famous  in  the  same  kind.^ 
But  the  oriental  writers,  who  should  best  know,  all  unani- 
mously agree,  that  there  was  but  one  Zerdusht  or  Zoroas- 
tres ;  and  that  the  time  in  which  he  flourished  was  while 
Darius  Hystaspes  was  king  of  Persia.^  It  is  certain  he  was 
no  king,  but  one  born  of  mean  and  obscure  parentage,  who 
did  raise  himself  wholly  by  his  craft  in  carrying  on  that  im- 
posture with  which  he  deceived  the  world.  They  who  place 
him  so  high  as  the  time  of  Ninus.  by  whom,  they  say,  he  was 

11  Abraham  Zacutus  in  Jucbasiii.  David  Ganz  in  Zemach  David.  Zedar 
01am  Zuta,  fcc.  xDan.ix.24. 

y  Justin,  lib.  1,  c.  1.    Diog.  Laertius  in  Prooemio,  Plin.  lib.  30,  c.  1. 

z  Plin.  lib.  36,  c.  1.     See  Stanley  of  the  Chaldaic  philosophy,  c.  2. 

a  Abulfaragius,  Ishmael  Abulfeda,  Shaiestani,  &ic.  vide  eliam  Agathiam. 
lib.  2.  et  Thomam  Hyde  dc  Religione  veterum  Pcrsariira.  c.  24. 


J500K  IV. J  THE   OLD  AXD  NEW  TESTAME.VTS.  311 

slain  in  battle,  follow  the  auihority  of  Justin  for  it.  But 
Diodorus  Siculus,^  out  of  Ctesias,  tells  us.  that  the  king  of 
Bactria,  with  whom  iSinus  had  war.  was  called  Ox\artes: 
and  there  are  some  ancient  manuscripts  of  Justin"^  in  which 
it  is  read  Ox_)artes.  and  perchafice  that  was  the  j^enuine 
reading,  and  Zoroastres  came  iiito  the  text  instead  of  it,  by 
the  error  of  the  copier,  led  thereto  perchance  bv  a  note  in 
the  martrin,  placed  there  bv  some  critic,  who.  from  the  cha- 
racter of  the  person,  took  upon  him  to  alter  the  name  ;  for 
he  is  there  said,  Aries  Magkas  j/rimo  invenisse,  i.  e.  That  he 
was  tht  first  inventor  of  JJagionism  ;  which  Zoroastres  onlv 
was  generally  taken  to  be,  though  in  truth  he  was  not  the 
founder  of  that  sect,  but  only  the  restorer  and  reformer  of 
it,  as  shall  be  hereafter  shown. 

He  was  the  greatest  impostor,  except  Mahomet,  that  ever 
appeared  in  the  world,  and  had  all  the  craft  and  enterpri- 
sing boldness  of  that  Arab,  but  much  more  knowledge: 
for  he  was  excellently  skilled  in  all  the  learning  of  the 
East  that  was  in  his  time  ;  whereas  the  other  could  neither 
write  nor  read  ;  and  particularly  he  was  thoroughly  versed 
in  the  Jewish  religion,  and  in  all  the  sacred  writings  of  the 
Old  Testament  that  were  then  extant,  which  makes  it 
most  likely  that  he  was,  as  to  his  origin,  a  Jew.  And  it  is 
generally  said  of  him,  that  he  had  been  a  servant  to  one 
of  the  prophets  of  Israel,  and  that  it  was  by  this  means  that 
he  came  to  be  so  well  skilled  in  the  holy  Scriptures,  and 
all  other  Jewish  knowledge;  which  is  a  farther  proof,  that 
he  was  of  that  people  :  it  not  being  likely,  that  a  prophet 
of  Israel  should  entertain  him  as  a  servant,  or  instruct 
him  as  a  disciple,  if  he  were  not  of  the  same  seed  of  Israel^ 
as  well  as  of  the  same  religion  with  him  ;  and  that  especial- 
ly since  it  was  the  usage  of  that  people,  by  principle  of  re- 
ligion, as  well  as  by  long  received  custom  among  them,  to 
separate  themselves  from  all  other  nations,  as  far  as  they 
were  able.  And  it  is  farther  to  be  taken  notice  of,  that 
most  of  those  who  speak  of  his  original  say,  that  he  was 
of  Palestine,  within  which  country  the  land  of  Judah  was. 
And  all  this  put  together,  amounts  with  me  to  a  convincino- 
proof  that  he  was  first  a  Jew.  and  that  by  birth  as  well  as  re- 
ligion, before  he  took  upon  him  to  be  prophet  of  the  31agiaD 
sect. 

The  prophet  of  Israel,  to  whom  he  was  a  servant,  some 
say,^  was   Elias,  and  others    Ezra  -.^  but  as  the  former  was 

b  Lib.  2,  p.  94.  c  So  saith  Ligerius. 

d  Religio  veterum  Persarum  per  Thotnam  Hyde,  c.  M. 
e  Abulfaragius,  p.  54. 

f  Abu  Mohammed  Mustapba,  Historicus  Arab.  Religio  veterum  Persa- 
rum,c.24,  p.  313 


J12  COXXEXION  OF   THE  HISTORV  Of  [fART  i. 

loo  early,  so  the  other  was  too  late  for  the  time  in  which 
he  lived.  With  this  best  agreeth  what  is  said  by  a  third  sort 
of  writers,^  that  it  was  one  of  the  disciples  of  Jeremiah, 
with  whom  he  served  ;  and.  if  so,  it  must  have  been  either 
Ezckiel  or  Daniel;  for  besides  these  two,  there  was  no  other 
prophet  of  Israel  in  those  times,  who  could  have  been  of 
the  disciples  of  Jeremiah.  And  as  Daniel  was  of  age  suffi- 
cient at  his  carrying  away  to  Babylon  (he  having  been  then 
about  eighteen  years  old,)  to  have  been  some  time  be- 
fore under  the  discipline  and  tutorage  of  that  prophet: 
so  having  continued  till  about  the  end  of  the  reign  of  Cy- 
rus, he  lived  long  enough  to  have  been  contemporary  with 
this  impostor  ;  which  cannot  be  said  of  Ezekiel ;  for  we 
hear  nothing  more  of  him  after  the  twenty-seventh  year  of 
the  captivity  of  Jehoiachin,  which  was  the  next  year  after 
the  taking  of  Tyre  by  Nebuchadnezzar ;  and  therefore  it 
is  most  likely,  that  he  lived  not  much  beyond  that  time. 
It  must  therefore  be  Daniel  under  whom  this  impostor  served; 
and  besides  him  there  was  not  any  other  master  in  those 
times  under  whom  he  could  acquire  all  that  knowledge, 
both  in  things  sacred  and  profane,  which  he  was  so  well  fur- 
nished with.  And  no  doubt,  his  seeing  that  great,  good,  and 
wise  man  arrive  to  such  a  height  and  dignity  in  the  empire, 
by  being  a  true  prophet  of  God,  was  that  which  did  set  this 
crafty  wretch  upon  the  design  of  being  a  false  one  ;  ho- 
ping, that,  by  acting  this  part  well,  he  might  obtain  the  same 
advancement,  and  by  pretending  to  that  which  the  other 
really  was,  arrive  to  the  like  honour  and  greatness  ;  and  it 
must  be  said,  that,  by  his  craft  and  dexterity  in  mana- 
ging this  pretence,  he  wonderfully  succeeded  in  what  he  aim- 
ed at.  It  is  said,  that,  while  he  served  the  prophet,  under 
whom  he  was  bred,  he  did,  by  some  evil  action,  draw  on 
him  his  curse,  and  that  thereon  he  was  smitten  with  leprosy. 
But  they  who  tell  us  this,  seem  to  be  such,  who  finding  Eliah 
said  to  be  his  master,  mistook  Elisha  for  Eliah,  and  there- 
fore thought  Gehazi  to  have  been  the  person. 

He  did  not  found  a  new  religion,  as  his  successor  in  impos- 
ture Mahomet  did,  but  only  took  upon  him  to  revive  and  re- 
form an  old  one,  that  of  the  Magians,  which  had  been  for 
many  ages  past  the  ancient  national  religion  of  the  Medes, 
as  well  as  of  the  Persians;  for  it  having  fallen  under  dis- 
grace on  the  death  of  those  ringleaders  of  that  sect,  who 
had  usurped  the  sovereignty  after  the  death  of  Cambyses, 

g  Bundari  ex  Abu  Japhar  Tabarita  Historico  Arabe,  Religio  veterum 
Persarum,  c.  24,  p.  314. 

h  Megidi  Persa.  Buddari.  Abu  Mohammed  Mustapha.  Religio  veterura 
Persarum,  c.  24,  p.  113,  114.  115, 


^aOK  iV.j  THE  0L1>  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS*  313 

and  the  slaughter  which  was  then  made  of  all  the  chief  men 
among  them,  it  sunk  so  low  that  it  became  almost  extinct, 
and  Sabianism  every  where  prevailed  against  it,  Darius  and 
most  of  his  followers  on  Ihat  occasion  going  over  to  it.' 
But  the  affection  which  the  people  had  for  the  religion  of 
their  forefathers,  and  which  they  had  all  been  brought  up 
in,  not  being  easily  to  be  rooted  out,  Zoroastres  saw,  that 
the  revival  of  this  was  the  best  game  of  imposture  that  he 
could  then  play ;  and  having  so  good  an  old  stock  to 
graft  upon,  he  did  with  the  greater  ease  make  all  his  new- 
scions  to  grow,  which  he  inserted  into  it. 

He  first  made  his  appearance  in  Media,*^  now  called  Ader- 
bijan,  in  the  city  of  Xix,  say  some;  in  that  of  Ecbatana, 
now  Tauris,  say  others  :  for  Smerdis  having  been  of  that 
province,  it  is  most  likely  that  the  sect  which  he  was  of  had 
still  there  its  best  rooting  ;  and  therefore  the  impostor  thought 
he  might  in  those  parts,  with  the  best  success,  attempt  the 
revival  of  it.  And  his  first  appearing  here  is  that  which  I 
suppose,  hath  given  some  the  handle  to  assert,  that  this 
was  the  country  in  which  he  was  born. 

The  chief  reformation  which  he  made  in  the  Magian  re- 
ligion was  in  the  first  principle  of  it ;'  for  whereas  before  they 
had  held  the  being  of  two  first  causes,  the  first  light,  or  the 
good  god,  who  was  the  author  of  all  good  ;  and  the  other 
darkness,  or  the  evil  god,  who  was  the  author  of  all  evil  5 
and  that  of  the  mixture  of  these  two,  as  they  were  in  a  con- 
tinual struggle  with  each  other,  all  things  were  made ;  he 
introduced  a  principle  superior  to  them  both,  one  supreme 
God,  who  created  both  light  and  darkness,  and  out  of  these 
two,  according  to  the  alone  pleasure  of  his  own  will,  made 
all  things  else  that  are,  according  to  what  is  said  in  Isaiah  xlv. 
5,  6,  7.  "  I  am  the  Lord,  and  there  is  none  else  :  there 
is  no  God  besides  me;  I  girded  thee,  though  thou  hast  not 
known  me,  that  they  may  know  from  the  rising  of  the  sun, 
and  from  the  west,  that  there  is  none  besides  me.  I  am 
the  Lord,  and  there  is  none  else.  I  form  the  light  and 
create  darkness,  I  make  peace  and  create  evil,  I  the  Lord  do 
all  these  things."  For  these  words  being  directed  to  Cyrus, 
king  of  Persia,  must  be  understood  as  spoken  in  reference 
to  the  Persian  sect  of  the  Magians,  who  then  held  light 
and  darkness,  or  good  and  evil,  to  be  the  supreme  beings, 

i  Vide  Pocockii  Specimen  Historiae  Arabics,  p.  147 — 149,  et  Thomara 
Hyde  de  Religione  veterum  Persarum. 

k  Bundari.  Abu  Japhar  Tabarita.  Religio  veteram  Persarum,  c.  24, 
Golii  Notaj  in  Alfraganum,  p.  207,  227. 

1  Abulfeda.  Ebn  Siiabna.  Pocockii  Specimen  Historiffi  Arab.  p.  147, 
148.    Religio  veterum  Persarum,  c.  9,  p.  163,  and  c.  22,  p.  29^. 

Vot-»  f ,  40 


314  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

without  acknowledging  the  great  God  who  is  superior  to 
both.  And  I  doubt  not  it  was  from  hence  that  Zoroas- 
tres  had  the  hint  of  mending  this  great  absurdity  in  their 
theology.  But  to  avoid  making  God  the  author  of  evil, 
his  doctrine  was,  that  God  originally  and  directly  created 
only  light  or  good,  and  that  darkness,  or  evil,  followed  it  by 
consequence,  as  the  shadow  doth  the  person ;  that  light 
or  good  had  only  a  real  production  from  God,  and  the 
other  afterward  resulted  from  it,  as  the  defect  thereof."  In 
sum,  his  doctrine  as  to  this  particular  was,  that  there  was 
one  supreme  Being  independent  and  self-existing  from 
all  eternity. °  That  under  him  there  were  two  angels,  one 
the  angel  of  light,  who  is  the  author  and  director  of  all  good  ; 
and  the  other  the  angel  of  darkness,  who  is  the  author  and 
director  of  all  evil ;  and  that  these  two,  out  of  the  mixture 
of  light  and  darkness,  made  all  things  that  are;  that  they 
are  in  a  perpetual  struggle  with  each  other  ;  and  that  where 
the  angel  of  light  prevails,  there  the  most  is  good,  and  where 
the  angel  of  darkness  prevails,  there  the  most  is  evil;  that 
this  struggle  shall  continue  to  the  end  of  the  world  ;"  that 
then  there  shall  be  a  general  resurrection, ^  and  a  day  of  judg- 
ment, wherein  Just  retribution  shall  be  rendered  to  all 
according  to  their  works  ;i  after  which  the  angel  of  dark- 
ness, and  his  disciples,  shall  go  into  a  world  of  their  own, 
where  they  shall  sutfer  in  everlasting  darkness  the  punish- 
ments of  their  evil  deeds ;  and  the  angel  of  light  and  his  disci- 
ples, shall  also  go  into  a  world  of  their  own,  where  they  shall 
receive  in  everlasting  light  the  reward  due  unto  their  good 
deeds  ;  and  that  after  this  they  shall  remain'  separated  for 
ever,  and  light  and  darkness  be  no  more  mixed  together  to 
all  eternity.  "■  And  all  this  the  remainder  of  that  sect,  which 
is  now  in  Persia  and  India,  do  without  anv  variation,  after  so 
many  ages,  still  hold  even  to  this  day.^  And  how  consonant 
this  is  to  the  truth,  is  plain  enough  to  be  understood  without 
a  comment.  And  whereas  he  taught,  that  God  originally 
created  the  good  angel  only,  and  that  the  other  followed 
only  by  the  defect  of  good,  this  plainly  shows,  that  he 
was  not  unacquainted  with  the  revolt  of  the  fallen  angels, 
and  the  entrance  of  evil  into  the  world  that  way,  but  had  been 
thoroughly  instructed  how  that  God  at  first  created  all  his  an- 

m  Sliahristani.     Religio  vet.  Pers.  c.  22,  p.  299. 

n  Abulfeda.  Shabristani.     Religio  vet.  Pens.  c.  22. 

o  Religio  vet.  Pers.  c.  9,  p.  163.     Pocockii  Specimen  Historian  Arab.  p.  148. 

p  Diogenes  Laertius  in  Prooemio.  Plutarchus  in  Iside  k  Osiride.  Shali- 
ristani.     Religio  vet.  Pers.  c.  22,  p.  296. 

q  Religio  vet.  Pers.  c.  33. 

r  Shaliristani.  Plutarchus  de  Iside  &:  Osiride.  Religio  vet.  Pars.  p.  299^ 
395,  &.C. 

s  Religio  vet  Pers.  c.  22,  p.  292,  293.     Ovington  s  Travel?. 


BOOK  IV.]  THE  OLD  AND  XEW  TESTAMEN'TS.  316 

gels  good,  as  he  also  did  man.  and  that  they  that  are  now- 
evil  became  such  wholly  through  their  own  tault,  in  falling 
from  that  state  which  God  first  placed  them  in.  All  which 
plainly  shows  the  author  of  this  doctrine  to  have  been  well 
versed  in  the  sacred  writings  of  the  Jewish  religion,  out  of 
which  it  manifestly  appears  to  have  been  all  taken;  only 
the  crafty  impostor  took  care  to  dress  it  up  in  such  a  style  and 
form,  as  would  make  it  best  agree  with  that  old  religion  of 
the  Medes  and  Persians  which  he  grafted  it  upon. 

Another  reformation  which  he  made  in  the  Magian  religion 
was,  that  he  caused  tire-temples  to  be  built  wherever  he 
came  :^  for  whereas  hitherto  they  had  erected  their  altars,  on 
which  their  sacred  tire  was  kept,  on  the  tops  of  hills,  and  on 
high  places  in  the  open  air,  and  there  performed  all  the 
offices  of  their  religious  worship,  where,  often  by  rain,  tem- 
pests, and  storms,  the  sacred  tire  was  extinguished,  and  the 
holy  otiices  of  their  religion  interrupted  and  disturbed  ;  for 
the  preventing  of  this  he  directed,  that  \Yherever  any  of  those 
altars  were  erected,  temples  should  be  built  over  them,  that 
so  the  sacred  tires  might  be  the  better  preserved,  and  the 
public  offices  of  their  religion  the  better  performed  before 
them.  For  all  the  parts  of  their  public  worship  were  per- 
formed bf'tore  these  public  sacred  tires,  as  all  their  private 
devotions  were  belore  private  tires  in  their  own  houses  ;  not 
that  they  worshipped  the  tire  (for  this  they  always  disowned,) 
but  God  in  the  tire.  For  Zoroastres.  among  other  his  impos- 
tures, having  feigned  that  he  was  taken  up  into  heaven,  there 
to  be  instructed  in  those  doctrines  which  he  was  to  deliver 
unto  men,  he  pretended  not  (as  I\Iahomet  after  did)  there 
to  have  seen  God,  but  only  to  have  heard  him  speaking  to 
him  out  of  the  midst  of  a  great  and  most  bright  liame  of 
fire  :  and  iheretbre  taught  his  followers  that  ti:e  was  the  truest 
Shechinah  of  the  divine  presence  :"  that  the  sun  being  the 
perfectest  fire,  God  had  there  the  throne  of  his  glory,  and 
the  residence  of  his  divine  presence,  in  a  more  excellent 
manner  than  any  where  els'e.  and,  next  that,  in  the  elemen- 
tary tire  with  us  ;  and  for  this  reason  he  ordered  them  still 
to  direct  all  their  v^-orship  to  God,  hrst  towards  the  sun 
(which  they  called  Mithra)  and  next  towards  their  sacred 
tires,  as  being  the  things  in  which  God  chietiy  dwelt :  and 
their  ordinarv  wav  of  worship  was  to  do  so  towards  bi>th  : 
for  when  they  came  before  these  tires  to  worship,  they  always 
approached  them  on  the  west  side,  that,  having  their  t'lccs 
towards  them,  and  also  toward  the   rising  sun  at  the  same 

t  Religiovet.Pers.  c.  1,  c.  S,  and  c.  29. 
n  Reli?io  vet.  Pers.  c.  8.  p.  lo'"^ 


316  c;ONNEXIO-\  OF  THE  HISTORY  OE  [PART  I. 

lime,  they  might  direct  their  worship  towards  both.*  And  in 
this  posture  ihey  always  performed  every  act  of  their  wor- 
ship. But  this  was  not  a  new  institution  of  his :  for  thus 
to  worship  before  fire  and  the  sun,  was,  as  hath  been  said,  the 
ancient  usage  of  that  sect;  and  according  hereto  is  it,  that 
we  are  to  understand  what  we  find  in  Ezekiel  viii.  16,  where 
it  is  related,  that  the  prophet  being  carried  in  a  vision  to 
Jerusalem,  to  see  the  abominations  of  that  place,  among  other 
impieties,  had  there  shown  him  "  about  five  and  twenty  men 
standing  between  the  porch  and  the  altar,  with  their  backs 
towards  the  temple  of  the  Lord,  and  their  faces  towards  the 
east ;  and  they  worshipped  the  sun."  The  meaning  of  which 
is,  that  they  had  turned  their  backs  upon  the  true  worship  of 
God,  and  had  gone  over  to  that  of  the  Magians.  For  the 
holy  of  holies  (in  which  was  the  Shcchinahof  the  divine  pre- 
sence resting  over  the  mercy-seat,)  being  on  the  western  end 
of  the  temple  at  Jerusalem,  ail  that  entered  thither  to  wor- 
ship God  did  it  with  their  faces  turned  that  way  :  for  that 
was  their  Kebla/  or  the  point  towards  which  they  always  di- 
rected their  worship.  But  the  Kcbla  of  the  Magians  being 
the  rising  sun,  they  always  worshipped  with  their  faces  turned 
that  way,  that  is,  towards  the  east.  And  therefore  these 
twenty-five  men,  by  altering  their  Kebla,  are  shown  to  have 
altered  their  religion,  and,  instead  of  worshipping  God  ac- 
cording to  the  Jewish  religion,  to  have  gone  over  to  the  re- 
ligion and  worship  of  the  Magians. 

Zoroastres  having  thus  retained,  in  his  reformation  of 
Magianism,  the  ancient  usage  of  that  sect  in  worshipping  God 
before  fire,  to  give  the  sacred  fires  in  the  temples  which 
he  had  erected  the  greater  veneration,  he  pretended,  that, 
when  he  was  in  heaven,  and  there  heard  God  speaking  to 
him  out  of  the  midst  of  fire,  he  brought  thence  some  of  that 
fire  with  him  on  his  return,  and  placed  it  on  the  altar  of  the 
first  fire-temple  that  he  erected^  (which  was  that  at  Xix  in 
Media,)*  from  whence  they  say  it  was  propagated  to  all  the 
rest.  And  this  is  the  reason  which  is  given  for  their  so  care- 
ful keeping  of  it:''  for  their  priests  watch  it  day  and  night, 
and  never  sutler  it  to  go  out  or  be  extinguished.*^  And  for 
the  same  reason  also  they  did  treat  it  with  that  superstition. 

X  Sanson  in  the  present  state  of  Persia,  p.  185.     Religio  vet.  Pers.  c.  4. 

y  Kebla,  among  tlie  eastern  nation?,  signifietli  the  point  of  the  lieaven.s 
towards  which  they  directed  their  worship.  The  Jews  did  it  towards  tlie 
temple  at  Jerusalem,  the  .Mahometans  towards  Mecca,  the  Sabians  towards 
the  Meridian,  and  the  Magians  towards  the  rising  sun. 

z  Religio  vet.  Pers.  c   8,  p.  160. 

a  Golii  Motai  ad  Alfraganum,  p  227. 

b  Strabo,  lib.  15.     Ammianus  Marcclliniis,  lih.  2-3.     Agathlas.  lib  2 

c  Religio  vet.  P<>rs.  c  2S,  p.  3-7 1,  &  r.2«.  p.  355. 


KOOK  IV.]  THE  OLD  AXD  ^^:^V  TESTAMENTS.  317 

that  they  fed  it  only  with  wood  stripped  of  its  bark,  and  of 
that  sort  which  they  thought  most  clean  ■,'^  and  they  never  did 
blow  it,  either  with  bellows  or  with  their  breath,  for  fear  of 
polluting  it ;''  and  to  do  this  either  of  those  ways,  or  to  cast  any 
unclean  thing  into  it.  was  no  less  than  death  by  the  law  of 
the  land,  as  long  as  those  of  that  sect  reigned  in  it,  which, 
from  the  time  of  Zoroastres  to  the  death  of  Yazdejerd,  the 
last  Persian  king  of  the  Magian  religion,  was  about  eleven 
hundred  and  titty  years  ;  yea,  it  went  so  far  that  the  priests 
themselves  never  approached  this  hre,  but  with  a  cloth  over 
their  mouths,  that  thev  might  not  breathe  thereon  f  and  this 
they  did.  not  only  when  they  tended  the  tire,  to  lay  more 
wood  thereon,  or  do  any  other  service  about  it,  but  also  when 
they  approached  it  to  read  the  daily  offices  of  their  liturgv 
betbre  it  :  so  that  they  mumbled  over  their  prayers  rather 
than  spoke  them,  in  the  same  manner  as  the  Popish  priests 
do  their  masses,  without  letting  the  people  present  articu- 
Jately  hear  one  word  of  what  they  said  ;  and,  if  they  should 
hear  them,  they  would  now  as  badly  understand  them  ;  for  all 
their  public  prayers  are,  even  to  this  day,  in  the  old  Persian 
language,  in  which  Zoroastres  first  composed  them,  about 
twenty-two  hundred  years  since,  of  which  the  common  peo- 
ple do  not  now  understand  one  word  :  and  in  this  absurdity 
also  have  they  the  Romanists  partakers  with  them.  When 
Zoroastres  composed  his  liturgy,  the  old  Persic  was  then  in- 
deed the  vulgar  language  of  all  those  countries  where  this 
liturgy  was  used  :  and  so  was  the  Latin  throughout  all  the 
western  empire  when  the  Latin  service  was  tirst  used  there- 
in. But  when  the  language  changed,  they  would  not  con- 
sider that  the  change  which  was  made  thereby,  in  the  reason 
of  the  thing,  did  require  that  a  change  should  be  made  in 
their  liturtry  also,  but  retained  it  the  same  after  it  ceased  to 
be  understood,  as  it  was  before.  So  it  was  the  superstitious 
folly  of  adhering  to  old  establishments  against  reason  that 
produced  this  absurdity  in  both  of  them  :  though  it  must  be 
acknowledged,  that  the  Alagians  have  more  to  say  for  them- 
selves in  this  matter  than  the  Romanists ;  for  they  are  taught, 
that  their  liturgy  was  brouuht  them  from  heaven,  wliich  the 
others  do  not  believe  of  theirs,  though  they  stick  to  it  as  if 
it  were.  And  if  that  stitfness  of  humour,  which  is  now  among 
too  many  of  us,  against  altering  any  thing  in  our  liturgy, 
should  continue,  it  must  at  last  bring  us  to  the  same  pass: 
for  all  languages  being  in  fluxu,  they  do  in  every  age  alter 
from  what  they  were  in  the  former  ;  and  therefore,  as  we  do 
not  now  understand  the  English  which  was  here  spoken  by 
our  ancestors  three  hundred  or  four  hundred  years  ago,  so, 

d  S(rabo,lib.  15.    Religio  vet.  Pers.  ibid. 

e  Strabo,  lib,  15.  p.  73-.    Retisio  vet.  Pei-^.  c.  30, 


3,18  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

in  all  likelihood,  will  not  our  posterity  three  hundred  or  four 
hundred  years  hence  understand  that  which  is  now  spoken  by 
us.  And,  therefore,  should  our  litui'^y  be  still  continued, 
without  any  change  or  alteration,  it  will  then  be  as  much  in 
an  unknown  language  as  now  the  Roman  service  is  to  the  vul- 
gar of  that  communion. 

But,  to  return  to  the  reformations  of  Zoroastres:  how  much 
he  followed  the  Jewish  platform  in  the  framing  of  them,  doth 
manifestly  appear  from  the  particulars  I  have  mentioned  : 
for  most  of  them  were  taken,  either  from  the  sacred  wri- 
tings, or  the  sacred  usages  of  that  people.  JVJoses  heard  God 
speaking  to  him  out  of  a  flame  of  fire  from  the  bush,  and  all 
Israel  heard  him  speaking  to  them  in  the  same  manner  out  of 
the  midst  of  fire  from  mount  Sinai  :  hence  Zoroastres  pre- 
tended to  have  heard  God  speaking  to  him  also  out  of  the 
midst  of  a  flame  of  fire.  The  Jews  had  a  visible  Shcchinah 
of  the  divine  presence  among  them  resting  over  the  mercy- 
seat  in  the  holy  of  holies,  both  in  their  tabernacle  and  tem- 
ple, toward  which  they  oflered  up  all  their  prayers  ;  and 
therefore  Zoroastres  taught  his  Magians  to  pretend  to  the 
like,  and  to  hold  the  sun,  and  the  sacred  fires  in  their  fire-tem- 
ples, to  be  this  Shechinah  in  which  God  especially  dwelt ;  and 
for  this  reason  they  offered  up  all  their  prayers  to  him  with 
their  faces  turned  towards  both.  The  Jews  had  a  sacred  fire 
which  came  down  from  heaven  upon  their  altar  of  burnt- 
offerings,  which  they  did  there  ever  after,  till  the  destruction 
of  Jerusalem  by  the  Chaldeans,  inextinguishably  maintain  : 
and  with  this  fire  only  were  all  their  sacrifices  and  oblations 
made,  and  Nadab  and  Abihu  were  punished  with  death  for 
offering  incense  to  God  with  other  fire.  And  in  like  manner 
Zoroastres  pretended  to  have  brought  his  holy  fire  from  hea- 
ven ;  and  therefore  commanded  it  to  be  kept  with  the  same 
care.  And  to  kindle  fire  on  the  altar  of  any  newly  erected 
fire-temple,  or  to  rekindle  it  on  any  such  altar,  where  it  had 
beenby  any  unavoidable  accident  extinguished, from  any  other 
fire,  than  from  one  of  the  sacred  fires  in  some  other  temple, 
or  else  from  the  sun,  was  reckoned  a  crime  to  be  punished  in 
the  same  manner.  And  whereas  great  care  was  taken  among 
the  Jews,  that  no  wood  should  be  used  on  their  altar  in  the 
temple,  but  that  which  they  reputed  clean,  and  for  this  rea- 
son they  had  it  all  barked  and  examined  before  it  was  laid 
on  ;  and  that  when  it  was  laid  on,  the  fire  should  never  be 
blowed  up  either  with  bellows  or  the  breath  of  man  for  the 
kindling  of  it  /  hence  Zoroastres  ordained  both  these  parti- 
culars to  be  also  observed  in  respect  of  his  sacred  fire  among 
his  Magians,  commanding  them  to  use  only  barked  wood  for 

f  See  Lightfoot's  Temple-service. 


HOOK  IV.j     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  31^ 

the  maintaining  of  it,  and  no  othermeans  for  the  kindling  of 
it  up  into  a  flame,  but  the  pourtng  on  of  oil  and  the  blasts  of 
the  open  air.^  And  that  he  should  in  so  many  things  write 
after  the  Jewish  religion,  or  have  been  so  well  iniormed 
therein,  can  scarce  seem  probable,  if  he  had  not  been  tirst 
educated  and  brought  up  in  it. 

Zoroastres,  having  thus  taken  upon  him  to  be  a  prophet  of 
God,  sent  to  reform  the  old  religion  of  the  Persians,  to  gain 
the  better  reputation  to  his  pretensions,  he  retired  into  a  cave, 
and  there  lived  a  long  time  as  a  recluse,  pretending  to  be 
abstracted  from  all  worldly  considerations,  and  to  be  given 
wholly  to  prayer  and  divine  meditations;  and,  the  more  to 
amuse  the  people  who  there  resorted  to  him,  he  dressed  up 
his  cave  with  several  mystical  figures,  representing  Mithra, 
and  other  mysteries  of  their  religion  ;  from  whence  it  became 
for  a  long  while  after  a  usage  among  them  to  choose  such 
caves  for  their  devotions,  which  being  dressed  up  in  the  same 
manner,  were  called  IVIithratic  caves. '^  AVhile  he  was  in  this 
retirement,  he  composed  the  book  wherein  all  his  pretended 
revelations  are  contained,  which  shall  be  hereafter  spoken  of. 
And  Mahomet  exactly  followed  his  example  herein  ;  for  he 
also  retired  to  a  cave  some  time  before  he  broached  his  im- 
posture, and,  by  the  help  of  his  accomplices,  there  formed 
the  Alcoran,  wherein  it  is  contained.  And  Pythagoras,'  on 
his  return  from  Babylon  to  Samos,  in  imitation  of  his  master 
Zoroastres,  (whom  Clemens  Alexandrinus  tells  us  he  emu- 
lously  followed,)*^  had  there  in  like  manner  his  cave  to  which 
he  retired,  and  wherein  he  mostly  abode  both  day  and 
night,  and  for  the  same  end  as  Zoroastres  did  in  his,  that 
is,  to  get  himself  the  greater  veneration  from  the  people  ; 
for  Pythagoras  acted  a  part  of  imposture  as  well  as  Zoroas- 
tres, and  this  perchance  he  also  learned  from  him. 

After  he  had  thus  acted  the  part  of  a  prophet  in  Media. 
and  there  settled  all  things  according  to  his  intentions,  he  re- 
moved from  thence  into  Bactria,'  the  most  eastern  province 
of  Persia,  and  there  settled  in  the  city  of  Balch,  which  lies 
on  the  river  Oxus,  in  the  contines  of  Persia,  India,  and  Cow- 
aresmia ;  where,  under  the  protection  of  Hystaspes,  the  fa- 
ther of  Darius,  he  soon  spread  his  imposture  through  all 
that  province  with  great  success  :  for  although  Darius,  after 
the  slaughter  of  the  Magians,  had,  with  most  of  his  followers, 
gone  over  to   the  sect  of  the  Sabians  ;    yet  Hystaspes  still 

g  Religio  Veterum  Persanim,  c.  29,  fc  c.  30. 

h  Porphyrius  in  libro  de  Nympharum  AnU'o,  p.  254.     Edit.  Cant. 
i  Porphyrius   in  Vita  Pythagoras,  p.  184.     Edit.  Cantab.     Janiblichus  in 
Vita  Pytbagora?,  c.  5. 
k  Stom.  1,  p.  223. 
I  Abu  Japhar  Tabarita.     Bundavi.    Religio  vet.  Pers.  c.  24, 


320  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORF  OF  [I'ARi    i 

adhered  to  the  religion  of  his  ancestors,  and,  having  6xed 
his  residence  at  Balch,  (where  it  may  be  supposed  he  go- 
verned those  parts  of  the  empire  under  his  son,)  did  there 
support  and  promote  it  to  the  utmost  of  his  power.  And,  in 
order  to  give  it  the  greater  reputation,  he  went  in  person 
into  India  among  the  Brachmans,  and.  having  there  learned 
from  them  all  their  knowledge  in  maiheinatics,  astronomy, 
and  natural  philosophy,  hebrouj^ht  it  back  among  his  Magians, 
and  thoroughly  instructed  them  in  it.™  And  they  continued 
for  many  ages  after,  above  all  others  of  those  times,  skilful 
in  these  sciences,  especially  after  they  had  been  farther  in- 
structed in  them  by  Zoroastres,  who  was  the  greatest  mathe- 
matician, and  the  greatest  philosopher  of  the  age  in  which 
he  lived;  and  therefore  took  care  to  improve  his  sect,  not 
only  in  their  religion,  but  also  in  all  natural  knowledge  ; 
which  so  much  advanced  their  credit  in  the  world,  that 
thenceforth  a  learned  man  and  a  Magian  became  equivalent 
terms.  And  this  proceeded  so  far,  that  the  vulgar,  looking 
on  their  knowledge  to  be  more  than  natural,  entertained  an 
opinion  of  them,  as  if  they  had  been  actuated  and  inspired 
by  supernatural  powers,  in  the  same  manneras,  too  frequently 
among  us,  ignorant  people  are  apt  to  give  great  scholars,  and 
such  "as  are  learned  beyond  their  comprehensions  (as  were 
Friar  Bacon,  Dr.  Faustus,°  and  Cornelius  Agrippa,")  the  name 
of  conjurers.  And  from  hence  those  who  really  practised 
wicked  and  dial)olical  arts,  or  would  be  thought  to  do  so,  taking 
the  name  of  Magians,  drew  on  it  that  ill  signification,  which 
now  the  word  Magician  bears  among  us ;  whereas  the  true 
and  ancient  Magians  were  the  great  mathematicians,  philo- 
sophers, and  divines,  of  the  ages  in  which  they  lived,  and 
had  no  other  knowledge  but  what  by  their  own  study,  and  the 
instructions  of  the  ancients  of  their  sect,  they  had  improved 
themselves  in.P 

But  it  is  not  to  be  understood,  that  all  Magians,  that  is, 
all  of  the  sect,  were  thus  learned,  but  only  those  who  had 
this  name  by  way  of  eminence  above  the  rest,  that  is,  their 

m  Amraianus  Marcellinus,  lib.  23. 

n  John  Faust  was  the  first  inventor  of  printing  at  Mentz,  and  from  thence 
being  taken  for  a  conjurer,  that  story  is  here  in  England  made  of  him,  which 
goes  under  the  name  of  Dr.  Faustus. 

o  That  which  contributes  most  to  the  opinion,  that  Cornelius  Agrippa 
was  a  Magician,  is  an  impertinent  book  published  under  his  name,  entitled, 
De  Occulta  Philosophia,  which  that  learned  man  was  never  the  author  of; 
for  it  is  not  to  be  found  in  the  folio  edition  of  his  works,  in  which  only 
those  that  are  genuine  and  truly  his  are  contained. 

p  Dion  Chrysostomus  tells  us  (in  Orationc  Borysthenica,)  that  the  Persians 
call  them  Magians  who  are  skilled  in  the  worship  of  the  gods,  and  not  as  the 
Greeks,  who  being  ignorant  of  the  meaning  of  the  word,  call  them  so  who 
were  skilful  in  gtptir  magic,  i.  e.  that  which  jugglers  and  conjurers  pretend 
♦o  make  use  of. 


BOOK  IV.J      THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  32i 

priests  ;  for  they  being  all  of  the  same  tribe/J  as  among  the 
Jews  (none  but  the  son  of  a  priest  being  capable  of  being  a 
priest  among  them,)  they  mostly  appropriated  their  learning 
to  their  own  families,  transmitting  it  in  them  from  father  to 
son,  and  seldom   communicating  it   to   any  other,   unless  it 
were  to  those  of  the  royal  family,''  whom  they  are  bound  to 
instruct,  the   better  to  fit  them  for  government ;  and  there- 
fore there  were  some  of  them,  as  tutors  as  well  as  chaplains, 
always  residing  in  the  palaces  of  their  kings.     And  whether 
it  were,  that  these  Magians  thought  it  would  bring  the  great- 
er credit  to  them,  or  the  kings,  that  it  would  add   a  greater 
sacredness  to  their  persons,  or  whether  it  were  from   both 
these  causes,  the  royal  family  among  the  Persians,  as  long  as 
this  sect  prevailed  among  them,  was  always  reckoned  of  the 
sacerdotal  tribe.     They    were   divided  into   three   orders.* 
The  lowest  were  the  inferior  clergy,  who  served  in  all  the 
common  offices  of  their  divine  worship :   next  above  them 
were   the   superintendents,  who  in  their  several  districts  go- 
verned the  inferior  clergy,  as  the  bishops  do  with  us  :  and 
above  all  was  the  Archimagus,  or  arch-priest,  who,  in  the 
same  manner  as  the  high-priest  among  the  Jews,  or  the  pope 
now  among  the  Romanists,  was  the  head  of  the  whole  religion. 
And,  according  to  the  number  of  their  orders,  the  churches 
or  temples  in  which  they  officiated  were  also  of  three  sorts. 
The  lowest  sort  were  the  parochial  churches,   or  oratories, 
which  were  served  by  the  inferior  clergy,  as  the  parochial 
churches  are  now  with  us ;  and  the  duties  which  they  there 
performed  were  to  read  the  daily  offices  out  of  their  liturgy, 
and,  at  stated  and  solemn  times,  to  read  some  part  of  their 
sacred  writings  to  the  people.     In  these  churches  there  were 
no  fire-altars ;  but  the  sacred  fire,  before  which  they  here 
worshipped,   was  maintained   only  in  a  lamp.     Next  above 
these   were   their  fire-temples,  in  which  fire  was  continually 
kept   burning  on  a  sacred  altar.     And  these  were,  in  the 
same  manner  as  cathedrals  with  us,  the  churches  or  temples 
where  the  superintendents  resided.     In  every  one  of  these 
were  also  several  of  the  inferior  clergy  entertained,  who,  in 
the   same  manner  as  the  choral  vicars  among  us,  perform- 
ed all  the  divine  offices  under  the  superintendent,  and  also 
took  care  of  the  sacred  fire,  which  they  constantly  watched 
day   and   night  by  four  and  four  in  their  turns,  that  it  miglit 
always  be  kept  burning,  and  never  go  out.     3dly,  The  high- 
est church  above  all  was  the  fire-temple,  where  the  Archi- 

q  Religio  vet.  Pers.  c.  30,  p.  367.    Tbeodoreti  Hist.  Eccles.  lib.  5,  c.  38. 
r  Plato   in  Alcibiade,  1.     Stobaeus,  p.  496,     Clemens  Alexandrinus   in 
Paedagogo,  1,  p.  81. 
s  Religio  vet.  Pers.  c.  28.  and  c  30. 
Vot.  I.  41 


322  COxVJSBXION  OT  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART   t. 

magus  resided,  which  was  had  in  the  same  veneration  with 
them  as  the  temple  of  Mecca  among  the  Mahometans,  to 
which  every  one  of  that  sect  thought  themselves  obhged  to 
make  a  pilgrimage  once  in  their  lives.  Zoroastres  first  set- 
tled it  at  Balch,  and  there  he,  as  their  Archimagus,  usually 
had  his  residence.  But  after  the  Mahometans  had  overrun 
Persia,  in  the  seventh  century  after  Christ,  the  Archimagus 
Avas  forced  to  remove  from  thence  into  Kerman,  which  is  a 
province  in  Persia,  lying  upon  the  Southern  ocean,  towards 
India,  and  there  it  hath  continued  even  to  this  day.  And  to 
the  fire-temple  there  erected,  at  the  place  of  his  residency, 
do  they  now  pay  the  same  veneration  as  formerly  they  did  to 
that  of  Balch.  This  temple  of  the  Archimagus,  as  also  the 
other  fire-temples,  were  endued  with  large  revenues  in  lands : 
but  the  parochial  clergy  depended  solely  on  the  tithes  and 
offerings  of  the  people;  for  this  usage  also  had  Zoroastres 
taken  from  the  Jewish  church,  and  made  it  one  of  his  esta- 
blishments among  his  Magians. 

The  impostor  having  thus  settled  his  new  scheme  of 
Magianism  throughout  the  province  of  Bactria,  with  the 
same  success  as  he  had  before  in  Media,  he  went  next  to 
the  royal  court  at  Susa,  where  he  managed  his  pretensions 
with  that  craft,  address,  and  insinuation,  that  he  soon  got 
within  Darius  himself,  and  made  him  a  proselyte  to  his  new- 
reformed  religion  ;  whose  example,  in  a  short  time,  drew 
after  it  into  the  same  profession  the  courtiers,  nobility,  and 
all  the  great  men  of  the  kingdom.*  This  happened  in  the 
thirtieth  year  of  Darius  ;  and,  although  it  succeeded  not 
without  great  opposition  from  the  ringleaders  of  the  Sabians, 
who  were  the  opposite  sect,  yet  the  craft,  address,  and  dex- 
terity of  the  impostor  surmounted  them  all,  and  so  settled 
his  new  device,  that  thenceforth  it  became  the  national  reli- 
gion of  all  that  country,  and  so  continued  for  many  ages 
after,  till  this  impostor  was  at  last  supplanted  by  that  of  Ma- 
homet, which  was  raised  almost  by  the  same  arts.  They 
who  professed  this  religion  in  Lucian's  time,"  as  reckoned 
up  by  him,  were  the  Persians,  the  Parthians,  the  Bactrians, 
the  Cowaresmians,  the  Arians,  the  Sacans,  the  Modes,  and 
many  other  barbarous  nations ;  but,  since  that,  the  new  im- 
posture hath  grown  up  to  the  suppressing  of  the  old  in  all 
these  countries.  However,  there  is  a  remnant  of  these  Ma- 
gians still  remaining  in  Persia  and  India,  who  even  to  this 
day  observe  the  same  religion  which  Zoroastres  first  taught 
them  ;  for  they  still  have  his  book,  wherein  their  religion  is 
contained,  which  they  keep  and  reverence  in  the  same  man- 
ner as  the  Christians  do  the.  Bible,  and  the  Mahometans 
t  Keligto  y^,  Per9»c,  24-  11  Irtidan  de  LoDg3?vi5r 


JBOOK  IV.]  THE  OLI>  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  323 

the  Alcoran,   making  it  the  sole  rule  both  of  their  faith  and 
manners. 

This  book  the  impostor  composed  while  he  hved  in  his 
retirement  in  the  cave  ;  and  therein  are  contained  all  his 
pretended  revelations.^  When  he  presented  it  to  Darius, 
it  was  bound  up  in  twelve  volumes,  whereof  each  consisted 
of  one  hundred  skins  of  vellum  ;  for  it  was  the  usage  of  the 
Persians  in  those  times  to  write  all  on  skins. ^  This  book  is 
called  Zendavesta,  and,  by  contraction,  Zend ;  the  vulgar 
pronounce  it  Zundavestow,  and  Zund.  The  word  originally 
signifieth  a  fire-kindler,  such  as  is  a  tinder-box  with  us ; 
which  fantastical  name  the  impostor  gave  it,  because,  as  he 
pretended,  all  that  would  read  this  book,  and  meditate 
thereon,  might  from  thence,  as  from  a  (ire-kindler,  kindle  in 
their  hearts  the  fire  of  all  true  love  for  God  and  his  holy  re- 
ligion. For  the  better  understanding  of  which,  it  is  to  be  ob- 
served, that,  in  those  eastern  countries,  their  way  of  kindling 
fire  is  not  by  a  tinder-box,  as  with  us,  but  by  rubbing  two 
pieces  of  cane  one  against  another,  till  one  of  them  takes  fire  : 
and  such  a  fire-kindler  of  his  religion  in  the  hearts  of  men  the 
impostor  would  have  his  book  to  be  ;  and  therefore  called 
it  by  that  name.  The  first  part  of  it  contains  their  liturgy, 
which  is  still  used  among  them  in  all  their  oratories  and  fire- 
temples  even  to  this  day.  The  rest  treats  of  all  other  parts 
of  their  religion.  And  according  as  their  actions  do  agree  or 
disagree  with  this  book,  do  they  reckon  them  to  be  either  good 
or  evil.  Thence,  in  their  language,  they  call  a  righteous 
action  Zend-aver,  i.  e.  what  the  book  Zendallorvs,  and  an  evil 
action  Na-Zend-aver,  i.  e.  rohich  the  book  Zend  disallows. 
This  book  Zoroastres  feigned  to  have  received  from  hea- 
ven, as  Mahomet  afterward  (perchance  following  his  pattern) 
pretended  of  his  Alcoran.  It  is  still  preserved  among  them 
in  the  old  Persian  language  and  character;  and  in  every  ora- 
tory and  fire-temple,  even  to  this  day,  there  is  a  copy  of  it 
kept  (in  the  same  manner  as  there  is  with  us  of  the  Bible  in 
every  parish  church,)  out  of  which,  on  certain  stated  times, 
the  priests  read  a  portion  of  it  to  the  people.  Dr.  Hyde,' 
late  professor  of  the  Hebrew  and  Arabic  tongues  at  Oxford, 
being  well  skilled  in  the  old  Persic,  as  well  as  the  modern, 
offered  to  have  published  the  whole  of  it  with  a  Latin  trans- 
lation, could  he  have  been  supported  in  the  expenses  of  the 
edition.  But  for  want  of  this  help  and  encouragement,  the 
design  died  with  him,  to  the  great  damage  of  the  learned 
world  :  for  a  book  of  that  antiquity,  no  doubt,  would  be  of 
great  use,  could  it  be  made  public  among  us,  and  would  unfold 

X  Religio  vet.  Pers.  c.  25,  26.  y  Diodorus  Siculus,  lih.  2.  p.  11?. 

■s  Vide  eundem  Dp  Religiane  vdU  Ptss  c  1.  p.  25>, 


324  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

and  give  us  light  into  many  things  of  the  times  wherein  it 
was  written,  which  we  are  now  ignorant  of. 

In  this  book  are  found  a  great  many  things  taken  out  of  the 
Scriptures  of  the  Old  Testament,  besides  those  1  have  already 
mentioned  ;  which  farther  proves  the  author's  original  to  have 
been  what  I  have  said  :  for  therein  he  inserts  a  great  part  of 
the  Psalms  of  David  ;  he  makes  Adam  and  Eve  to  have  been 
the  first  parents  of  all  mankind,  and  gives  in  a  manner  the 
same  history  of  the  creation  and  the  deluge  that  Moses  doth  ; 
only  as  to  the  former,  whereas  Moses  tells  us,  that  all  things 
were  created  in  six  days,  Zoroastrcs  converts  those  six  days 
into  six  times,  allowing  to  each  of  those  times  several  days ; 
so  that,  putting  them  all  together,  the  time  of  the  creation, 
according  to  his  account,  amounted   to   three  hundred  and 
sixty-five  days,  that  is,  a  whole  year.   He  speaks  therein  also 
of  Abraham,  Joseph,  Moses,  and  Solomon,  in  the  same  man- 
ner as  the  Scriptures  do.  And  out  of  a  particular  veneration 
for  Abraham,  he  called  his  book  the  look  of  Jibraham,  and  his 
religion  the  religion  of  Abraham  :  for  he  pretended,  that  the 
reformation  which  he  introduced,  was  no  more  than  to  bring 
back  the  religion  of  the  Persians  to  that  original   purity  in 
which  Abraham  practised  it,  by  purging  it  of  all  those  defects, 
abuses,  and  innovations,  which  the  corruptions  of  after-times 
had  introduced  into    it.     And  to  all  this  Mahomet  also  (no 
doubt  from  this  pattern)  afterward  pretended  for  his  religion  : 
for  the  name  of  Abraham  hath  tor  a  great  many  ages  past 
been  had  in  great  veneration  all  over  the  East,  and  among  all 
sects;  so  that  every  one  of  them  have  thought  it  would  give 
reputation  to  them,  could  they  entitle  themselves  to  him  : 
for  not  only  the  Jews,  the  Magians,  and  the  Mahometans,  but 
the  Sabians,  and  also  the  Indians  (if  the  Brahama  of  the  lat- 
ter be  Abraham,  as  it  is  with  good  reason  supposed,)  all  chal- 
lenge him  to  themselves,  as  the  great  patriarch  and  founder 
of  their  several  sects  ;  every  one  of  them  pretending,  that 
their  religion  is  the  same  which  Abraham  professed,  and  by 
his  reformation  established  among  them:  and  to  restore  this 
reformation  was  all  that  Zoroastres,  Mahomet,  and  the  author 
of  the  Sabian  sect,  whoever  he  was,  pretended  to.    This  ve- 
neration for  Abraham  in  those  parts,   proceeded  from   the 
great  fame  of  his  piety,   which    was  (it  is  supposed)  there 
spread  among  them  by  the   Israelites  in  their  dispersion   all 
over  the  East,  first  on  the  Assyrian,  and  after  on  the  Baby- 
lonish ca[)tivitv.     And  this  fame  being  once  fixed,  made  all 
parties  fond  of  having  him  thought  their  own  ;  and  therefore 
all  laid  claim  to  him.     And,  in  tliis^book,  Zoroastres   com- 

n  Porockii  SpKrimen  HiM.  Ai'ah,  p.  148.     Religio  vefenim  P»;rpar'iiT^ 


BOOK  IV.]     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  326 

mands  also  the  same  observances  about  beasts  clean  and  un- 
clean, as  Moses  doth  ;  gives  the  same  law  of  paying  tithes  to 
the  sacerdotal  order  ;  enjoins  the  same  care  of  avoiding  all 
external,  as  well  as  all  internal  pollutions  ;  the  same  way  of 
cleansing  and  purifying  themselves,  by  frequent  washings  ; 
the  same  keeping  of  the  priesthood  always  within  the  same 
tribe,  and  the  same  ordaining  of  one  high-priest  over  all ;  and 
several  other  institutions  are  also  therein  contained  of  the 
same  Jewish  extraction.  The  rest  of  its  contents  are  an 
historical  account  of  the  life,  actions,  and  prophecies  of  its 
author,  the  several  branches  and  particulars  of  his  new  re- 
formed superstition,  and  rules  and  exhortations  to  moral  living, 
in  which  he  is  very  pressing,  and  sufficiently  exact,  saving 
only  in  one  particular,  that  is,  about  incest :  for  therein  he 
wholly  takes  this  away,  and,  as  if  nothing  of  this  nature  were 
unlawful,  allows  a  man  to  marry,  not  only  his  sister  or  his 
daughter,  but  also  his  mother  ;^  and  it  went  so  far  with  that 
sect  in  the  practice,  that,  in  the  sacerdotal  tribe,  he  that  was 
born  of  this  last  and  worst  sort  of  incest,  was  looked  on  as 
the  best  qualified  for  the  sacerdotal  function  ;  none  being  es- 
teemed among  them  more  proper  for  the  highest  stations  in 
it,  than  those  that  were  born  of  mothers  who  conceived  them 
of  their  own  sons  ;  which  was  such  an  abomination,  that 
though  all  things  else  had  been  right  therein,  this  alone  is 
enough  to  pullute  the  whole  book.  The  Persian  kings  being 
exceedingly  given  to  such  incestuous  marriages,  this  seems 
to  have  been  contrived  out  of  a  vile  piece  of  flattery  to  them, 
the  better  to  engage  and  fix  them  to  their  sect.  But  Alexan- 
der,*^  when  he  conquered  Persia,  did  put  an  end  to  this  abo- 
mination ;  for  he  did  by  a  law  forbid  all  such  incestuous  co- 
pulations among  them. 

Zoroastres  having  obtained  this  wonderful  success,  in 
making  his  imposture  to  be  thus  received  by  the  king,  the 
great  men,  and  the  generality  of  the  whole  kingdom,*^  he  re- 
turned back  again  to  Balch  ;  where,  according  to  his  own  in- 
stitution, he  was  obliged  to  have  his  residence,  as  Archima- 
gus,  or  head  of  the  sect;  and  there  he  reigned  in  spirituals, 
with  the  same  authority  over  the  whole  empire,  as  the  king 
did  \n  temporals  ;  and  from  hence  perchance  might  proceed 
the  mistake  of  making  him  king  of  Bactria,  Balch  being  in 
that  province.  And  his  being  said  to  have  been  there  slain 
in  battle  by  Ninus,  might  also  have  its  original  from  his  suf- 
fering this  fate  in  that  country,  although  from  another  hand  : 

b  Diogenes  Laertius  in  Procemio.  Strabo.lib.  15.  Philo  Judaus  de  spe- 
cialibus  legibus,  p.  778.  Tertullian  in  Apologetico.  Clemens  AlexarKlrinus 
in  Paedagog.  1.  p.  81,  et  Strom  3,  p.  314. 

r  Plutarchns  de  Fortuna  Alexandri.  d  Religiavet.  Pers.  c.  24 


•826  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

for,  after  his  return  to  Balch,  having  enterprised  upon  Ar- 
gasp,  king  of  the  oriental  Scythians  (who  was  a  zealous  Sa- 
bian,)  to  draw  him  over  to  his  religion,  and  backed  this  at- 
tempt with  the  authority  of  Darius,  the  more  prevalently  to 
induce  him  to  it,  the  Scythian  prince  resented  it  with  such 
indignation  to  be  thus  imperiously  addressed  to  concerning 
this  matter,  that  he  invaded  Bactria  with  an  army  ;  and  having 
there  defeated  tlie  forces  of  Darius  that  opposed  him,  slew 
Zoroastres,  with  all  the  priests  of  his  patriarchal  church, 
which  amounted  to  the  number  of  eighty  persons,  and  demo- 
lished all  the  fire-temples  in  that  province.  This  happened 
in  the  thirty-fifth  year  of  the  reign  of  Darius.  The  Per- 
sians tell  us,  that  Lorasp,  or  Hystaspes,  the  father  of  Darius, 
was  slain  also  in  the  same  war.  But,  if  he  lived  so  long,  he 
must  then  have  been  exceeding  old  ;  for,  allowing  him  to 
have  been  no  more  than  twenty  on  his  first  coming  with  Cy- 
ras out  of  PeVsia,  he  must  now  have  been  ninety-three 
3ears  old.  But  this  is  no  strange  thing  in  those  parts  ;  for  the 
air  being  thoroughly  pure  and  healthy,  the  perspiration  free 
and  regular,  and  all  the  fruits  of  the  earth  fully  concocted, 
they  who  can  there  avoid  the  excesses  of  lust  and  luxury, 
usually  live  to  a  great  age  :  of  which  we  have  lately  had  two 
instances,  in  Aurang-Zeb,  king  of  India,  and  Rajah-Singah, 
king  of  Candia,  in  the  island  of  Ceylon,  the  former  dying  in 
the  year  1 708,  of  the  age  of  near  one  hundred,  and  the  other 
about  twenty  years  before,  much  older. 

But  Darius  soon  revenged  the  injury  upon  the  Scythian 
king :  for,  falling  on  him  before  he  could  make  his  retreat, 
he  overthrew  him  with  a  great  slaughter,  and  drove  him  out 
of  the  province  ;  after  which  he  rebuilt  again  all  the  fire- 
temples  that  had  been  demolished  by  the  enemy,  and  espe- 
cially that  at  Balch  ;  which  he  erected  with  a  grandeur  suit- 
able to  its  dignity,  it  being  the  patriarchal  temple  of  the  sect; 
and  therefore,  from  the  name  of  its  restorer,  it  was  thence- 
forth called  Azur  Gustasp,*^  i.  e.  the  fire-temple  of  Darius 
Hystaspes.  And  the  care  which  he  took  in  this  matter,  shows 
the  zeal  which  he  had  for  his  new  religion,  which  he  still 
continued  to  propagate  after  the  death  of  its  author  with  the 
same  ardouras  before.  And, the  betterto  preserve  its  credit 
and  reputation  after  this  accident,  he  thenceforth  took  it 
on  himself  to  be  their  Archimagus  :  for  "^Porphyry  tells  us, 
he  ordered,  before  his  death,  that,  among  other  his  titles,  it 
should  be  engraven  on  his  monument,  that  he  was  Master  of 
fhe  Magians  ;  which  plainly  implies,  that  he  bore  this  office 


c  Religio  veterum  Persarum,  c.  23. 
f  Porphyrias  de  Abstinentia,  lib.  4, 


p.  165.  edit.  Cant' 


BOOK  IV.]     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMETSTS.  6^7 

among  them,)  for  none  but  the  Archimagus  was  master  of 
the  whole  sect.)  But  it  was  not  long  that  he  was  in  it ;  for 
he  died  the  next  year  after.  However,  from  hence  it  seems 
to  have  proceeded,  that  the  kings  of  Persia  were  ever  after 
looked  on  to  be  of  the  sacerdotal  tribe,  and  were  always^  ini- 
tiated into  the  sacred  order  of  the  Magians,  before  they 
took  on  them  the  crown,  or  were  inaugurated  into  the  king- 
dom. 

The  Greeks  had  the  name  of  Zoroastres  in  great  esteem, 
speaking  of  him  as  the  great  master  of  all  human  and  divine 
knowledge. ''  Plato,'  Aristotle,''  Plutarch,'  and  Porphyry,'" 
mention  him  with  honour,  acknowledging  his  great  learning; 
and  so  do  others.  Pliny  saith  much  ofhim  ;"  and  particularly 
remarks,  that  he  was  the  only  person  that  laughed  on  the  day 
in  which  he  was  born  ;  and  that  the  pulsation  of  his  head  did 
then  beat  so  strong  that  it  heaved  up  the  hand  laid  upon  it ;  which 
last,  he  saith,  was  a  presage  of  his  future  learning.  Solinus 
tells  us  the  same  story  of  his  laughing  on  the  day  of  his  birth  ; 
and  saith,  that  he  was  Optimarum  artium  peritissimus,  i.  e. 
Most  skilful  in  the  knowledge  of  the  best  arts,"  And  Apuleius's 
character  of  him  is,  that  he  was  Onmis  divini  arcani  antisles^ 
7.  e.  The  chief  doctor  in  all  divine  mysterieS'^  Cedrenus 
names  him  as  a  famous  astronomer  among  the  Persians,  and 
Suidas  saith  of  him,  that  he  excelled  all  others  in  that 
science. "i  And  this  reputation  he  still  hath  over  all  the  East, 
even  among  those  who  are  most  averse  to  his  sect  to  this  very 
day  :  for  they  all  there,  as  well  Mahometans  as  Sabians,  give 
him  the  title  of  Hakim,  that  is,  of  a  wise  and  learned  philo- 
sopher, and  reckon  him  as  the  most  skilful  and  eminent  of 
their  ancient  astronomers. "^  And  particularly  Ulugh  Beigh, 
that  famous  and  learned  Tartarian  prince,  writing  a  book  of 
astronomy  and  astrology,  doth  therein  prefer  Zoroastres  be- 
fore all  others  for  his  skill  and  knowledge  in  these  sciences."* 
It  is  to  be  observed  also,  that  they  who  write  of  Pythagoras, 
do  almost  all  of  them  tell  us,  that  he  was  the  scholar  of  Zo- 
roastres at  Babylon,  and  learned  of  him  most  of  that  know- 
ledge which  afterward  rendered  him  so  famous  in  the  West. 
So  saith  Apuleius,*^  and  so  say  Jamblichus,"  Porphyry,^  and 
Clemens  Alexandrinus  5^  (for  the  Zabratus  or  Zaratus  of  Por- 

g  Cicero  de  Divinatione,  lib.  1.    Philo  Judaeus  de  Specialibus  Legibus  Pin- 
tarchus  in  Artaxerxe. 

h  Diogenes  Laerlius  in  Prooemio.  i  In  Alcibiade  1. 

k  In  libro  de  Magia  citaute  Lcertio  in  Prooemio. 

1  De  Iside  et  Osiride.  m  In  vita  Pythagors. 

n  Lib.  30,  c.  1,  &.  lib.  7,  c.  16.  o  Cap.  1. 

p  Floridoruin  Secundo.  q  In  vocibus  Mctyoi&i  As-fovo/uut  &l  ZopMrfi';- 

V  Religio  vet.  Pers.  c.  24,  p.  312.  s  Ibid. 

t  Floridoruni  secundo.  u  In  vita  Pythagoraj,  c.  4. 

X  Ibid.  p.  165.  edit.  Cant,  y  Strom.  1,  p.  223. 


323  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OP  [PART  i. 

phyry,  and  the  Na-Zaratus  of  Clemens,  were  none  other  than 
this  Zoroastres ;)  and  they  relate  the  matter  thus  ;  that  when 
Cambyses  conquered  Egypt,  he  found  Pythagoras  there  on 
his  travels,  for  the  improvement  of  himself  in  the  learning  of 
that  country  ;  that,  having  taken  him  prisoner,  he  sent  him 
with  other  captives  to  Babylon,  where  Zoroastres  (or  Zabra- 
tus,  as  Porphyry  calls  him)  then  lived ;  and  that  there  he  be- 
came his  disciple,  and  learned  many  things  of  him  of  the 
eastern  learning.''  The  words  of  Porphyry  are,  '  That  by 
Zabratus  he  was  cleansed  from  the  pollutions  of  his  life  past, 
and  instructed  from  what  things  virtuous  persons  ought  to  be 
free,  and  also  learned  from  him  the  discourse  concerning  na- 
ture, and  what  are  the  principles  of  the  universe.'*  This 
story  may  well  enough  agree  with  the  time  of  Zoroastres, 
but  it  cannot  do  so  with  the  time  of  Pythagoras  ;  what  is 
therein  said  of  his  being  carried  captive  to  Babylon,  it  is 
possible  might  have  happened  when  Nebuchadnezzar  con- 
quered Egypt,  but  could  not  be  when  it  was  conquered  by 
Cambyses;''  the  chronology  of  the  life  of  Pythagoras  may 
very  well  admit  of  the  former,  but  can  never  of  the  latter : 
for,  by  that  time  Cambyses  had  conquered  Egypt,  Pythago- 
ras had  been  settled  in  Italy  above  twenty  years,  after  all  his 
travels  were  over,  and  was  then  grown  an  old  man,  being 
then  about  the  sixty-third  year  of  his  age.  But,  however, 
that  Pythagoras  was  at  Babylon,  and  learned  there  a  great 
part  of  that  knowledge  which  he  was  afterward  so  famous  for, 
is  agreed  by  all,*^  though  there  may  be  some  error,  as  to  the 
time  when  he  is  said  to  have  been  there,  or  the  manner  how 
he  came  thither.  His  stay  there,  Jamblichus  tells  us,  was 
twelve  years  5*^  and  that,  in  his  converse  with  the  Magians, 
he  learned  from  them,  (over  and  above  what  hath  been  afore 
mentioned  out  of  Porphyry,)  arithmetic,  music,  and  the  know- 
ledge of  divine  things,  and  the  sacred  mysteries  pertaining 
thereto.  But  the  most  important  doctrine  which  he  brought 
home  from  thence,  was  that  of  the  immortality  of  the  soul : 
for  it  is  generally  agreed  among  the  ancients.^  that  he  was 
the  first  of  all  the  Greeks  that  taught  it.  Aiid  this  I  take  for 
certain  he  had  from  Zoroastres ;  for,  as  1  have  afore  shown,  it 
was  his  doctrine,  and  he  is  the  ancicntest  whom  we  have  upon 
record  of  all  the  heathen  nations  that  taught  it.  But  Pytha- 
goras did  not  bring  this  doctrine  into  Greece  with  that  purity 

z  Jamblichus  de  vita  Pythagoroe,  c.  4.    Apuleius  Floridorum  secundc. 
a  In  vita  Pytbagorce,  p.  285.  edit  Cant. 

b  See  the  bishop  of  Worcester's  tract  of  the  life  of  Pythagoras, 
c  Diogenes  Laertius,  Porphyrius  et  Jamblichus  in  vita  Pythagorae. 
d  Jamblichus  in  vita  Pythagor2e,  lib.  4. 

ePorphyrus  ia   vita  Pvthasroraf,  p.  18«.  et20J.  edit   Cant.  Jairh"/^bii«  ;-■ 
vifa  l-vtha»r»r».  r.  •?'?. 


£*0K  iV.J  THE  OLD  AXD  XEW  TESPaMEXIS.  S23 

in  which  he  received  it  from  his  master ;  for  having  cor- 
rupted it  with  a  mixture  of  the  Indian  philosophy,  (for  this 
also  he  had  learned  in  the  East,)  he  made  this  immortality 
to  consist  in  an  eternal  transmigration  of  the  soul  from  one 
body  to  another  f  whereas  Zoroastres's  doctrine  was,s  that 
there  is  to  be  a  resurrection  of  the  dead,  and  an  immortal 
state  after  to  follow  in  the  same  manner  as  Daniel  taught,'' 
and  the  people  of  God  then  held,  and  we  now;  and  there 
is  no  doubt  but  that  he  had  it  from  them. 

Some  of  the  ancient  heretics,  especially  the  followers  of 
Prodicus,  pretended  to  have  the  secret  books  of  Zoroastres, 
containing  his  revelations,  and  other  mysteries  of  religion, 
and  offered  to  make  use  of  them  in  defence  of  their  here- 
sies.' Against  these  Plotinus  and  Porphyry  did  both  write, 
and  fully  showed  them  to  have  been  the  forgeries  of  the 
Gnostic  Christians.*^  And  others  have  gathered  together  out 
of  Proculus,  Simplicius,  Damascius,  Synesius,  Olympiodorus, 
and  other  writers,  what  they  call  the  oracles  of  Zoroastres; 
and  several  editions  have  been  published  of  them  in  Greek 
with  the  scholia  or  comments  of  Pletho  and  Psellus.  But  all 
these  are  mere  figments  coined  by  the  Platonic  philosophers, 
who  lived  after  the  time  of  Christ,  and  are  condemned  as 
such  by  St.  Chrysostome,  who  plainly  tells  us  that  they 
were  all  figments.'  If  any  are  desirous  to  see  what  unintel- 
hgible  and  nonsensical  stuff  these  oracles  do  contain,  they 
may  consult  Mr.  Stanley's  book  of  theChaldaic  philosophy, 
which  is  published  at  the  end  of  his  History  of  Philosophy, 
where  they  will  find  them  translated  into  English  from  the 
collection  of  Francis  Patricias. 

Abul-Pharagius  tells  us,  that  Zerdusht  (or  Zoroastres) 
foretold  to  his  Magians  the  coming  of  Christ,  and  that,  at  the 
time  of  his  birth,  there  should  appear  a  wonderful  star,. 
which  should  shine  by  day  as  well  as  by  night;  and  there- 
fore left  it  in  command  with  them,  that  when  the  star  should 
appear,  they  should  follow  the  directions  of  it,  and  goto  the 
place  where  he  should  be  born,  and  there  offer  gifts,  and  pay 
their  adoration  unto  him  ;  and  that  it  was  by  this  command, 
that  the  three  wise  men  came  from  the  East,  that  is,  out 
of  Persia,  to  worship  Christ  at  Bethlehem.""  And  so  far 
Sharistani,  though  a  Mahometan  writer,   doth  agree  with 

f  Porphyrius  in  vita  Pythagoraj,  p.  17,  edit.  Cant,  et  Jamblichus  et  Dio- 
genes Laertius  in  vitaejusdem. 

g  Diogenes  Laertius  in  Procemio. 

h  Cbap.  xii.  2, 3. 

i  Clemens  Alexandrinus.     Strom.  1,  p.  223. 

k  Vide  Lucam  Hoisteniutn  de  vitaet  scriptis  Porpbyrii,  c.9,  p.  57.  edit 
Cant. 

I  In  vita  Babvlffi  Marfyri?.  ra  HistorVa  Dvn*tiarym,p.  ^'^' 

Vol-,  L     "  42 


330  COJN'NEXION  OF  THE  HISTt^RY  OF  [pART  I. 

him,  as  that  he  tells  us,  that  Zerdusht  (or  Zoroastres)  fore- 
told the  coming  of  a  wonderful  person  in  the  latter  times, 
who  should  reform  the  world  both  in  religion  and  righteous- 
ness ',  and  that  kings  and  princes  should  become  obedient  to 
him,  and  give  him  their  assistance  in  promoting  the  true  re- 
ligion, and  all  the  works  thereof."  But  what  these  attribute 
to  the  prophecy  of  Zoroastres,"  others  refer  to  the  prophecy 
of  Balaam  ;  and  say,  that  it  was  by  his  prediction,  that  the 
wise  men  were  led  by  the  star  to  seek  Christ  in  Judea,  and 
there  pay  their  adoration  unto  him.  But  all  this  seems  to  be 
taken  out  of  the  legendary  writings  of  the  Eastern  Chris- 
tians. And  Abul-Pharagius,  though  an  Arab  writer,  being 
by  religion  a  Christian,  it  is  most  likely,  that  what  he  tells 
us  of  this  matter  was  taken  from  them. 

Those  who  are  still  remaining  of  this  sect  in  Persia  have 
there  the  name  of  Gaurs,P  which  in  the  Arabic  signifieth  In- 
fidels, and  is  the  usual  appellation  which  the  Mahometans  be- 
stow on  all  that  are  not  of  their  religion.  But  those  peo- 
ple have  this  name  in  Persia  by  way  of  eminency,  as  if  there 
were  none  other  such  like  them ;  and  therefore  they  are 
there  called  by  it,  as  if  it  were  their  national  name,  and  are 
known  by  none  other  in  that  country,  and  whosoever  speaks 
of  a  Gaur  there,  understands  none  other  by  it,  than  one  of 
this  sect.  They  have  a  suburb  at  Hispahan,  the  metropolis 
of  Persia,  which  is  called  Gaurabad,  or  the  town  of  the 
Gaurs,  where  they  are  employed  only  in  the  meanest  and 
vilest  drudgeries  of  the  town.  And  some  of  them  are  scat- 
tered abroad  in  other  places  of  that  country,  where  they 
are  made  use  of  in  the  like  services.  But  the  bulk  of  them 
is  in  Kerman,  which  being  the  barrennest  and  worst  pro- 
vince of  all  Persia,  and  where  others  care  not  to  dwell,  the 
Mahometans  have  been  content  to  permit  them  to  live  there 
with  some  freedom  and  the  full  exercise  of  their  religion. 
But  every  where  else  they  use  them  as  dogs,  esteeming  them 
as  to  their  religion  the  worst  of  all  those  that  differ  from 
them  ;  and  it  is  with  a  wonderful  constancy  that  they  bear 
this  oppression.  Some  ages  since,  for  the  avoiding  of  it, 
several  of  them  fled  into  India,  and  settled  there  in  the 
country  about  Surat,  where  their  posterity  are  still  remain- 
ing even  to  this  day.  i\nd  a  colony  of  them  is  settled  in 
Bombay,  an  island  in  those  parts  belonging  to  the  English, 
where  they  are  allowed,  without  any  molestation,  the  full 
freedom  and  exercise  of  their  religion.''     They  are  a  poor, 

n  Heligio  vet.  Pers.  c.  31,  p.  382,  383,  o  Theodoras  Tarsensis. 

p  Thevenot's  Travels.     Sanson's  present  slate  of  Fersia.    Tavernier  Re» 
ligio  vet.  Pets.  c.  29. 
q  Ovingfon's  Travel? 


200K  IV. j      THE  OLW  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.        331 

harmless  sort  of  people,  zealous  in  their  superstition,  rigo- 
rous  in  their  morals,  and  exact  in  their  dealings,  professing 
the  worship  of  one  God  only,  and  the  belief  of  a  resurrec- 
tion and  a  futurejudgment,  and  utterly  detesting  all  idolatry, 
although  reckoned  by  the  Mahometans  the  most  guilty  of  it ; 
for  although  they  perform  their  worship  before  fire,  and  to- 
wards the  rising  sun,  yet  they  utterly  deny  that  they  wor- 
ship either  of  them.  They  hold,  that  more  of  God  is  in 
these  his  creatures  than  in  any  other,  and  that  therefore  they 
worship  God  toward  them,  as  being  in  their  opinion  the  truest 
Shechinah  of  the  divine  presence  among  us,  as  darkness  is 
that  of  the  devil's  ;  and  as  to  Zoroastres,  they  still  have  him 
in  the  same  veneration,  as  the  Jews  have  Moses,  looking  on 
him  a:s  the  great  prophet  of  God,  by  whom  he  sent  his  law, 
and  communicated  his  will  unto  them. 

Xerxes,  having  ascended  the  throne,  employed  the  first 
year  of  his  reign  in  carrying  on  the  preparations  for 
the  reduction  of  Egypt,  which  his  father  had  begun.''  xerxts^j. 
He  confirmed  to  the  Jews  at  Jerusalem  all  the  pri- 
vileges granted  them  by  his  father,  especially  that  of  having 
the  tribute  of  Samaria  for  the  furnishing  them  with  sacrifices 
for  the  carrying  on  of  the  divine  worship  in  the  temple  of 
God  in  that  place.^ 

In  the  second  year  of  his  reign  he  marched  against  the 
Egyptians,  and,  having  thoroughly  vanquished  and 
subdued  these  revolters,  he  reduced  them  under  an  xerxet^t' 
heavier  yoke  of  servitude  than  they  were  before ; 
and  then  towards  the  end  of  the  year,  after  having  made 
Achemcnes,  one  of  his  brothers,  governor  of  the  province, 
returned  again  to  Susa.' 

This  year  Herodotus,  the  famous  historian,  was  born  at 
Halicarnassus  in  Caria  ;  for  he  was  fifty-three  years  old  when 
the  Peloponnesian  war  first  began." 

Xerxes  being  puffed  up  with  his  success  against  the  Egyp- 
tians, upon  the  advice  and  instigation  of  Maiuonius, 
the  son  of  Gobrias,  who  had  married  one  of  his  sis-  xeixet^s 
ters,  resolved   upon  a  war  with  Greece  ;  and  in   or- 
der thereto,  made  great  preparations   for  three  years  toge- 
ther throughout  all  the  provinces  of  the  Persian  empire.'' 

Jeshua  the  high-priest  of  the  Jews  at  Jeruialetn,  died  in 
the  fifty-third  year  of  his  high-priesthood,^  and  Jehoiakim 
his  son  succeeded  him  in  that  office.^ 

Xerxes,  being  resolved  on  the  Grecian  war,  entered 
into    a    league   with   the  Carthaginians :    whereby   it   was 

r  Herodotus,  lib.  7.  s  Josepluis  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  5. 

11  Aulus  Gellius,  lib.  15,  c.  23.  y  Chroiiicon  Alexandrinum 

y.  Nehemiah  xii.  10.    Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  10,  c.  5. 


332  t:OXAEXieN  OP  THE  HIiTOIiy  Ol'  [vART  I. 

•3i«rxe^s^4  agiccd,  that,  while  the  Persians  invaded  Greece, 
the  Carthaginians  should  fall  on  all  those  who  were 
of  the  Grecian  name  in  Sicily  and  Italy,  that  thereby  they 
might  be  diverted  from  helping  one  the  other.  And  the 
Carthaginians  made  choice  of  Hamilcar  to  be  their  general 
in  this  war,  who  not  only  raised  what  forces  he  could  in 
Africa,  but  also  with  the  money  sent  him  by  Xerxes,  hired  a 
great  number  of  mercenaries  out  of  Spain,  Gallia,  and  Italy ; 
so  that  he  got  together  an  army  of  three  hundred  thou- 
sand men,  and  a  fleet  proportionable  hereto,  for  the  prose- 
cuting of  the  intent  of  this  league/ 

And  thus  Xerxes,  according  as  was  foretold  by  the  pro- 
phet Daniel,''  having  by  his  strength,  and  through  his 
X^iet^k  ^^'^^^  riches,  stirred  up  all  the  then  known  habitable 
world  against  the  realm  of  Grecia,  that  is,  all  the  West 
under  the  command  of  Hamilcar,  and  all  the  East  under  his 
own,  he  did,  in  the  fifth  year  of  his  reign,*^  which  was  the 
tenth  after  the  battle  of  Marathon,''  set  out  from  Susa  to  be- 
gin the  war,  and  having  marched  as  far  as  Sardis,  wintered 
there. 

Early  the  next  spring®  Xerxes  did  set  out  for  the  Helles- 
pont ;  over  which  two  bridges  of  boats  having  been 
xfrwfe.  laiclj  ^^^  <^"G  ^^^  ^^^  army,  and  the  other  for  his  car- 
riages and  beasts  of  burden,  he  passed  all  over  in 
seven  days  ;  during  all  which  time  they  were  continually 
passing  day  and  night,  before  all  could  get  over ;  so  great 
Avas  the  i^umber  of  them  that  attended  him  in  this  expedition. 
From  thence  marching  through  the  Thracian  Chersoncsus, 
he  arrived  at  Doriscus,  a  city  at  the  mouth  of  the  river 
Hebrus,  in  Thracia  ;  at  which  place  having  encamped  his 
army,  and  ordered  his  fleet  also  to  attend  him  on  the  adja- 
cent shore,  he  there  took  an  account  of  both.  His  land 
army,  upon  the  muster,  was  found  to  be  one  million  seven 
hundred  thousand  foot,  and  eighty  thousand  horse,  besides 
his  chariots  and  his  camels,  for  which,  allowing  twenty  thou- 
sand more,  the  whole  will  amount  to  one  million  eight  hun- 
dred thousand  men.  His  fleet  consisted  of  twelve  hundred 
and  seven  ships  of  the  line  of  battle,  besides  galleys,  trans- 
ports, victuallers,  and  other  sorts  of  vessels  that  attended, 
which  were  three  thousand  more  ;  on  board  all  which  were 
reckoned  to  be  five  hundred  and  seventeen  thousand  six 
hundred  and  ten  men.  So  tliut  the  whole  number  of  forces 
by  sea  and  land,  which  Xerxes  brought  with  him  out  of  Asia 

a  Diod.  Sic.  lil).  II.  b  Daniel  xi.  2. 

c  Herodot.  lib.  7.  d  Tiiucydides,  lib.  1. 

e  Herodot.  lib.  7.     Diod.  Siciil-.is'.  Til>    U.     V'ljUBrr.hu?  in  Themislocle  e' 
Arl.stiiN!'.     .Tii<tin.  lib.  "2.  >:.  1^ 


HOOKIV.j  J  HE  OLD  AXD  NEW  TESTAMENTS-  533 

to  invade  Greece,  amounted  to  two  millions  three  hundred 
and  seventeen  thousand  six  hundred  and  ten  men.  After 
his  passing  the  Hellespont,  the  nations  on  this  side,  that  sub- 
mitted to  him,  added  to  his  land  army  three  hundred  thousand 
men  more,  and  two  hundred  and  twenty  ships  to  his  fleet, 
on  board  of  which  were  twenty-four  ihousand  men.  So 
that,  putting  all  together,  his  forces  by  sea  and  land,  by  that 
lime  he  came  to  the  straits  of  the  Thermopylae,  made  up  the 
number  of  two  millions  six  hundred  and  forty-one  thousand 
six  hundred  and  ten  men.  And  the  servants,  eunuchs,  wo- 
men, sutlers,  and  all  such  other  people  as  followed  the  camp, 
were  computed  to  be  no  less  than  as  many  more.  So  that 
the  whole  number  of  persons  of  all  sorts,  that  followed 
Xerxes  in  this  expedition,  were  at  least  five  millions.  This 
is  Herodotus's  account  of  them,^  and  Plutarch=  and  Isocrates'' 
agree  with  him  herein.  But  Diodorus  Siculus,'  Pliny,*^ 
iElian,*  and  others,  do,  in  their  computations,  fall  much  short 
of  this  number,  making  the  army  of  Xerxes,  with  which  he 
passed  the  Hellespont  against  Greece,  to  be  very  little  more 
than  that  with  which  Darius  his  father  passed  the  Bosphorus 
to  make  war  upon  the  Scythians.  It  is  probable  they  might 
have  mistaken  the  one  for  the  other.  The  verses  engraved 
on  the  monument  of  those  Grecians,  who  were  slain  at  Ther- 
mopylae, best  agree  with  the  account  of  Herodotus ;  for  in 
them  it  is  said  that  they  there  fought  against  two  millions  of 
men.*"  And  he  being  the  ancientest  author  that  hath  written 
of  this  war,  and  having  lived  in  the  age  in  which  it  happen- 
ed, and  treated  of  it  more  particularly,  and  with  a  greater  ap- 
pearance of  exactness  than  any  other,  his  computation  seem- 
eth  the  most  likely  to  be  the  truest ;  and  that  especially  since 
we  find  it  to  be  the  general  opinion  of  the  ancients,  both 
Greeks  and  Latins,  that  this  was  the  greatest  army  that  was 
ever  brought  into  the  field. 

Josephus  tells  us,"  that  a  band  of  Jews  was  also  in  this 
army,  and  brings  for  proof  of  it  a  passage  out  of  the  poet 
Chcerilus,  who,  in  describing  the  army  of  Xerxes,  as  they 
passed  on  by  their  several  nations  in  their  march,  hath  these 
verses  : 

Then  next  did  march  in  habit  and  in  mien,, 

A  people  wonderful  for  to  be  seen  ; 

Their  language  is  in  dialect  the  same. 

Which  men  do  speak  of  the  Phamician  name. 

They  dwell  in  the  hii^h  Solymaean  land, 

On  hills,  near  which  there  doth  a  great  lake  stand. 

4  Herodot.  lib.  7.  g  In  Themistocie.  h  In  Panathenaico. 

i  Lib.   11.  k  Lib.  33,  c.  10.  1  Vor.  Histor  lib.  13,  c.  3. 

m  Herodot.  lib.  7.  Diod.  Siculus,  lib.  11,  p.  26.  This  inscription,  accord- 
ing to  the  reading  as  in  Herodotus,  saith  ihey  were  three  millions,  but  as  in 
Diodorus  only  two  millioirs  n  Contra  Apionem.,  lib.  1. 


534  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  f.. 

Jerusalem,  having  also  had  the  name  of  Soljma,"  and  all 
the  country  thereabout  being  mountainous,  and  lying  near 
the  great  lake  Asphaltites,  commonly  called  the  lake  of  So- 
dom, this  description  seems  plainly  to  suit  the  Jews,  espe- 
cially since  it  is  also  mentioned,  that  they  spake  the  Phoeni- 
cian language,  the  Syriac  being  then  the  vulgar  language  of 
the  Je\YS.  But  Scaliger,^  Cuna2us,i  and  Bochartus,'  under- 
stand it  of  the  Solymi  in  Pisidia.  However,  Salmasius 
maintains  the  contrary  opinion,  and  justifies  Josephus  in  it  f 
and  it  must  be  said,  that  it  is  not  at  all  likely,  that  when 
Xerxes  called  all  the  other  nations  of  the  Persian  empire 
to  follow  him  to  this  war,  the  Jews  alone  should  be  excused 
from  it.  And  therefore  whether  these  whom  Chajrilus 
speaks  of,  were  Jews  or  not,  it  must  be  taken  for  certain, 
that  they  also  did  bear  a  part  in  this  expedition. 

After  Xerxes  had  taken  this  account  of  his  fleet  and  army 
at  Doriscus,*^  he  marched  from  thence  with  his  army  through 
Thrace,  Macedon,  and  Thessaly,  towards  Attica,  and  ordered 
his  fleet  to  attend  him  on  the  coast  all  the  way,  making  the 
same  stations  by  sea,  that  he  did  by  land.  All  yielded  to  him 
in  his  march  without  any  opposition,  till  he  came  to  the  straits 
of  Thermopylae;  where  Leonidas,  king  of  the  Lacedaimo- 
nians,  with  three  hundred  Spartans,  and  as  many  other 
Greeks  as  made  up  a  body  of  four  thousand  men,  defended 
the  pass  against  him.  For  two  days  he  made  it  good  against 
all  the  numerous  army  of  the  Persians,  repulsing  them  in 
every  assault  with  a  great  slaughter  of  their  men.  But  on 
the  third  day,  being  ready  to  be  surrounded  by  the  Persians 
through  the  treachery  of  a  certain  Greek,  who  led  them  by 
a  secret  way  over  the  mountains,  to  fall  on  them  in  the  rear, 
all  retired,  saving  Leonidas  and  his  three  hundred  Spartans^ 
and  some  few  others  that  would  not  desert  them,  who  reso- 
lutely abiding  by  the  post  they  had  undertaken  to  defend, 
were  at  length  all  slain  upon  the  spot.  But  the  Persians 
paid  very  dear  for  this  victory,  having  lost  in  the  gaining  of 
it  twenty  thousand  of  their  men,  and  among  them  two  of 
the  brothers  of  Xerxes. 

After  this,  Xerxes  entered  through  Boeotia  into  Attica,  the 
country  of  the  Athenians  ;  having  spent  in  his  march  thither 
since  his  passing  the  Hellespont  four  months."  The  Athe- 
nians, not  able  to  defend  themselves  against  so  great  a  force, 

o  By  abbreviation  for  Hierofolyma. 

p  In  Notis  ad  Fragmenta.  q  De  Republica  Hebracorum,  lib.  2,  c.  18. 

r  Geographia  Sacra,  part  2,  lib.  1,  c.  2. 
s  In  Ossilegio  Linguae  HellenisticEB. 

t  Herodotus,  lib.  7.     Diodor.  Sic.  lib.  11.    Plutarchus  in  Tliemistocle. 
u  Herodotusjlib.  8.     Diodor.  Sic.  lib.  11.     Plutarchus  in  Aristide  &  The- 
hiisfocle. 


BOOK  IV.]  THE  OLD  AND   NEW  TiESTAMENTS.  336 

deserted  their  city,  putting  all  their  men  aboard  their  fleet, 
and  securing  their  wives  and  children  in  Salamis,  ^gina, 
and  Troezene,  neighbouring  cities,  which,  by  the  intervention 
of  the  sea,  were  out  of  the  reach  of  his  army  ;  so  that,  on 
his  coming  thither,  he  became  master  of  the  place  without 
any  opposition. 

In  the  interim,  the  Persian  and  Grecian  fleets  lying  near 
each  other,  the  former  at  Aphetas,  and  the  other  at  Artimi- 
sium,  above  Euboea,  had  several  encounters  with  each  other, 
in  every  one  of  which  the  Grecians  had  the  advantage  ;  and 
though  it  was  not  great,  yet  it  served  them  to  show,  that  the 
enemy,  notwithstanding  their  great  number,  were  not  invin- 
cible ;  which  gave  them  the  heart  afterward,  with  the  greater 
courage  and  resolution,  to  fight  against  them.  However, 
their  ships  being  much  shattered  by  these  several  encounters, 
they  found  it  necessary  to  retire  to  some  safer  place  to  refit; 
and  for  this  purpose  came  into  the  straits  of  Salamis,  where 
they  not  only  refitted,  but  were  also  reinforced  and  augment- 
ed by  a  great  many  other  ships,  which,  from  several  parts  of 
Greece,  came  thither  to  them,  and  there  joined  them  against 
the  common  enemy,  till  at  length  they  made  up  a  fleet  up- 
ward of  three  hundred  sail.^  It  was  while  they  lay  there, 
that  Xerxes  entered  Athens  ;  and  thereon  the  Persian  fleet 
came  hither  also,  and  anchored  at  Phalerus,  a  port  on  that 
shore.  The  straits  of  Salamis,  where  the  Greek  fleet  lay, 
was  the  most  advantageous  place  for  them  to  fight  the  nume- 
rous fleet  of  the  enemy  in  that  they  could  choose ;  for  the 
Persians,  by  reason  of  the  narrowness  of  that  sea,  not  being 
able  to  extend  their  front  in  it  beyond  that  of  the  Greeks, 
could  there  have  no  advantage  from  their  numbers;  but  al- 
though their  fleet  was  four  times  as  great,  must  in  that  place 
fight  upon  equal  terms ;  which  Themistocles  the  general  of 
the  Athenians,  having  wisely  observed,  did,  by  his  prudence 
and  dexterity,  bring  it  to  pass,  that  there  it  came  to  a  battle 
between  them  ;  wherein  the  Grecians,  by  the  advantage  of 
the  place,  gained  the  victory,  and  gave  the  enemy  such  an 
overthrow,  as  wholly  dashed  all  the  aims  and  designs  of  this 
prodigious  expedition,  which  was  one  of  the  greatest,  both 
lor  expense  and  number  of  men,  that  was  ever  undertaken  ; 
for  they  having  destroyed  two  hundred  of  their  ships,  besides 
those  which  they  took,  the  rest  got  away  to  the  Asian  coast: 
and  having  set  in  at  Cyma,  a  city  in  iEolia,  they  there  laid 
up  for  the  winter,  and  never  came  again  into  Greece  ;  and 
Xerxes  being  frighted  with  an  apprehension  lest  the  conquer- 
ors should  sail  to  the  Hellespont,  and  there  obstruct  his  rc- 

X  Herodotus,  lib.  8.    PI'Harchu?  in  Thcmistocle,    Diodor.  Sic.  lib.  11. 


3oG  CONNEXION  or  THE  HISTORY  Of  [PART  i 

turn,  fled  thither  with  all  the  haste  and  precipitation  he 
could,  and,  having  left  Mardonius  with  three  hundred  thou- 
sand men  to  carry  on  the  war  in  Greece,  marched  back  with 
the  rest  to  Sardis,  and  there  took  up  his  quarters  for  the  en- 
suing year.  It  is  remarkable,  that  at  his  coming  to  the  Hel- 
lespont, finding  the  bridge  of  boats  which  he  had  left  there 
broken  by  storms,  he  who  had  passed  over  that  sea  but  a  (ew 
months  before  wiih  such  pomp  and  pride,  was  forced  to  re- 
pass it  in  a  poor  fish-boat. 

About  the  same  time  his  confederates,  the  Carthaginians, 
met  with  as  great,  or  rather  a  much  greater  defeat,  in  Sicily  :-' 
for  Haiuilcar  their  general,  having  drawn  together  his  nume- 
rous army,  of  which  I  have  already  spoken,  and  shipped  them 
on  board  the  vast  fleet  which  he  had  prepared  for  their  trans- 
portation, sailed  with  them  for  Sicily,  and  having  there  land- 
ed them  at  Panormus,  a  port  in  that  island,  laid  siege  to  Hi- 
mera,  a  maritime  city  in  the  neighbourhood.  While  he  lay 
there,  for  his  better  security,  he  caused  two  large  camps  to 
he  fortified  in  the  one  of  which  he  lodged  his  land  army,  and 
into  the  other  he  drew  up  his  ships,  placing  there  all  his 
marines  for  their  defence.  At  that  time  Gelo  was  king  of 
Sicily,  a  prince  of  great  wisdom,  conduct,  and  valour.  As 
soon  as  he  had  an  account  of  this  invasion,  he  ilrew  together 
an  army  of  fifty  thousand  foot,  and  five  thousand  horse,  and 
marched  immediately  against  the  enemy,  for  the  defence  of 
the  country.  On  his  arrival  at  Himera,  he  intercepted  a 
courier  carrying  letters  from  the  Salinutines,  confederates  of 
the  Carthaginians,  to  Hamilcar ;  whereby  he  understood,  that 
the  next  morning  Hamilcar  was  to  celebrate  a  great  sacrifice 
to  Neptune  at  the  camp  of  the  marines,  and  that  he  had  ap- 
pointed the  Salinuntine  horse  then  to  come  thither  to  him, 
Gelo,  taking  the  advantage  of  this  intelligence,  the  next  morn- 
ing, at  the  time  appointed,  sent  thither  a  party  of  horse  of 
his  own,  who  being  received  into  the  camp  for  the  Salinun- 
tiues,  first  slew  Hamilcar,  and  then  set  the  fleet  on  fire.  As 
soon  as  this  was  done,  Gelo  having  notice  of  it  by  a  signal 
given  him  from  the  top  of  an  adjacent  hill,  where  he  had 
placed  watchmen  for  this  purpose,  drew  out  his  army  before 
the  other  camp  of  the  enemy,  and  gave  them  battle.  But 
the  flame  ascending  from  the  camp  of  the  marines,  soon  tell- 
ing the  Carthaginians  the  fate  of  their  fleet,  and  a  messenger 
at  the  same  time  bringing  them  an  account  of  the  death  of 
their  [|-eneral,  this  so  disheartened  and  confounded  them,  that, 
having  no  longer  any  courage  to  stand  their  ground,  they 
were  soon  put  to  the  rout,  and  Gelo  slew  of  them  one  hun- 

y  HerOi'.otus,  lib.  7.    Dicrdorus  Siculusrlib,  11.  __ 


his  numerous  army  in,  or  a  ground  proper  for  his  cavalry  to 

;,  Lib.  7.  ii  Lib.  I ! .  b  Hefodotus,  lib.  7. 

c  Herociotus,  lib.  S.     Uiodorus  Siculus,  lib.  1 1.    Plufarcluis   in  Aristide  « 
ihetnistocle.    Justin,  lib.  2,  c,  14. 
d  Herodotus,  lib,  9. 
Vor..  T.  4- 


noon  IV. 'j  THKi»Li)  A\U  MilW  TKiTAMfiNTS.  SST 

dred  and  fifty  thousand  on  the  field  of  battle,  and  took  all  the 
rest  prisoners,  which  were  as  many  more,  and  sold  them  all 
for  slaves  ;  so  that  all  Sicily  was  filled  with  them.  This  de* 
feat  was  so  entire,  that  of  all  this  prodigious  fleet  and  army,  the 
greatest  that  was  ever  set  forth  in  those  western  parts  for  any 
expedition,  it  is  remarked  none  returned,  save  only  a  fev/, 
who  escaped  in  a  cock-boat,  to  bring  this  dismal  news  to 
Carthage.  Merodotus  tells  us,  that  this  battle  was  fought  on 
the  same  day  with  that  of  Sniamis  f-  but  Diodorus  Siculus 
says  it  was  at  the  time  when  Leonidas  was  slain  at  Thermo- 
mopylae  f-  which  seems  to  be  the  truer  account  of  the  two  t 
for,  after  this  success  of  Gelo,  the  Grecians  sent  to  him  for 
his  assistance  against  Xerxes,''  which  they  would  not  have  done 
after  the  battle  of  Salamis.  For  from  thenceforth  they 
thought  themselves  alone  more  than  sufficient  for  the  enemy, 
without  needing  any  other  force  than  that  of  their  own  to 
finish  the  war. 

On  Xerxes's  departure  out  of  Greece,  Mardonius  winter- 
ed his  army  in  Thessaly  and  Macedonia,  and  early 
the  next  spring  marched  with  it  into  Bceotia.'"'  From  j^rkef?! 
hence  he  sent  Alexander,  king  of  Macedonia,  to 
Athens,  with  proposals  of  accommodation  from  the  king* 
Thereby  he  offered  them  to  rebuild,  at  the  king's  charges, 
whatsoever  had  been  burned  or  demolished  in  Attica  the 
former  year,  to  permit  them  to  live  according  to  their  own 
]aws,||to  reinstate  them  in  all  their  former  possessions,  and  to 
add  to  them  whatsoever  other  lands  they  should  desire.  But 
the  Athenians,  not  being  to  be  induced  to  desert  the  interest 
of  Greece  for  any  advantage  whatsoever,  would  hearken  to 
none  of  these  otfcrs:  whereon  Mardonius,  being  enraged  by 
the  refusal,  marched  with  all  his  army  into  Attica,  destroying 
every  thing  wherever  he  came,  and,  entering  Athens,  burned 
and  demolished  whatsoever  he  there  found  standing  after  the 
former  year's  devastation  f  for  the  Athenians,  not  being  strong 
enough  to  resist  such  a  torrent,  had  the  second  lime  with* 
drawn  to  Salamis,  iEgina,  and  Troczcne,  and  left  the  city 
empty.  In  the  interim,  the  joint  forces  of  all  Greece  being- 
drawn  together  at  the  isthmus  of  Corinth,  Mardonius  thought 
fit  to  march  back  again  into  Bosotia  ;  for  that  being  an  open 
and  level  country,  was  much  fitter  for  him  to  fight  in  than  At- 
tica, which  being  rough  and  craggy,  and  full  of  hills  and  defiles 
could  scarce  any  where  afford  him  room  enough  to  draw  up 
his  numerous  army  in,  or  a  ground  proper  for  his  cavalry  to 

7.  Lib.  7.  :i  Lib.  11.  b  HefodoUis,  lib.  7. 

c  Herodotus,  lib.  S.     Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  1 1.     IMufarclius   in  Aristide  ** 
Ihemistocle.    Juslin,  lib.  3,  c.  14. 
d  Herodotus^  lib,  9. 


330  CONXCXIOX  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [I'ART  *;, 

60  any  service  in.  On  his  return,  lie  encamped  on  the  river 
iEsopus ;  thither  the  Greeks  marched  after  him,  under  the 
command  of  Pausanias,  king  of  Lacedtemon,  and  Aristides, 
general  of  the  Athenians.  They  consisted  of  one  hundred 
and  twenty  thousand  men,  and  the  Persians  of  three  hundred 
and  fifty  thousand,  saith  Herodotus,^  of  five  hundred  thousand, 
saith  Diodorus  Siculus  •/  and  with  these  forces,  near  the  city 
of  PlataBa,  it  came  to  a  decisive  battle  between  them,  in 
which  Mardonius  was  slain,  and  all  the  Persian  army  cut  in 
pieces.  Only  Artabazus,  who  was  aware  of  the  event,  from 
the  ill  conduct  which  he  had  observed  in  Mardonius,  made  an 
early  escape  with  forty  thousand  men,  which  he  commanded, 
and,  by  his  speed,  outmarching  the  fame  of  the  defeat,  got 
safe  to  Byzantium,  and  there  passed  over  into  Asia.  Besides 
these,  not  four  thousand  of  all  the  rest  escaped  the  carnage 
of  that  day,  but  were  all  slain  and  cut  in  pieces  by  the  Greeks  ; 
and  this  quite  delivered  them  from  all  farther  invasions  of 
that  people ;  for  from  that  time  a  Persian  army  was  never 
more  seen  on  this  side  the  Hellespont. 

On  the  sameday  that  the  Greeks  fought  this  battle  at  PlataBa,s 
their  naval  forces  got  as  memorable  a  victory  over  the  re- 
mainder of  the  Persian  fleet  in  Asia  :  for  at  the  same  time 
that  their  land  forces  rendezvoused  at  the  isthmus  of  Corinth, 
their  fleet  having  met  together  at  .^gina,  under  the  com- 
mand of  Leotychides,  the  other  king  of  the  Lacedaemonians, 
and  Xantippus,  the  Athenian,  there  came  thither  to  them  am- 
bassadors from  the  lonians,  to  invite  them  into  Asia,  to  deli- 
ver the  Greek  cities  there  from  the  slavery  of  the  barbarians  : 
whereon  they  sailed  for  Delos  in  their  way  thither ;  and,  while 
Ihey  lay  there,  other  ambassadors  came  to  them  from  Samos, 
who  having  acquainted  them,  that  the  Persian  fleet  which 
wintered  atCyma,  having  sailed  thence,  were  then  at  Samos, 
and  might  there  be  easily  vanquished  and  destroyed  by  them, 
earnestly  solicited  them  to  come  thither  and  fall  upon  thera; 
whereon  they  accordingly  set  sail  forthwith  for  Samos.  But 
the  Persians,  hearing  of  their  approach,  retired  to  Mycale,  a 
promontory  on  the  continent  of  Asia,  where  their  land  army 
lay,  consisting  of  one  hundred  thousand  men,  which  were 
the  remainder  of  those  which  Xerxes  had  brought  back 
out  of  Greece  the  former  year;  and  there  drew  up  their 
ships  upon  the  land,  and  fortified  them  with  a  strong  rampart 
drawn  round  them.  But  the  Greeks  following  them  thither, 
by  the  assistance  of  the  lonians,  who  revolted  to  them,  van- 
quished their  army  at  land,  took  their  rampart,  and  burned 
all  their  ships.     And  here    ended   all   the  great   designs  of 

etib.  9.  f  Lib.  11. 

g  H^rodotUS;  lib.  9..     HioJowis  SlcuFu',  lib,  1 1 


IVOOK  IV.j  XJH£    OLD  AND  NEW  TKST AMEiNTS,  339 

Xetxes  in  a  most  miserable  disappointment,  there  being,  af- 
ter these  two  battles,  scarce  any  of  all  that  prodigious  armv, 
with  which,  the  year  before,  he  marched  so  proudly  over  the 
Hellespont,  now  left,  whom  either  the  famine,  the  pestilence, 
or  the  sword,  had  not  absolutely  destroyed,  excepting  those 
whom  Artabazus  brought  back  out  of  Greece  5  and  of  these 
a  great  number  died,  on  their  return  into  Asia,  by  their  over- 
glutting  themselves  with  the  plenty  of  that  country,  after  the 
hardships  they  had  suffered  on  the  other  side  of  the  Helles- 
pont. A  greater  fleet  and  army  was  scarce  ever  set  forth  in 
the  West  for  any  expedition,  than  that  of  Hamilcar's  against 
Sicily,  or  ever  was  there  a  greater  army  brought  together  any 
where,  than  that  wherewith  Xerxes  invaded  Greece  ;  yet  all 
these  numerous  forces  were  baffled,  defeated,  and  destroyed, 
by  those  who,  in  number,  or  power,  reckoning  all  the  armies 
on  both  sides  against  each  other,  could  scarce  bear  the  name 
of  an  handful  of  men  in  comparison  of  them  ;  and  hereby  a 
signal  instance  was  given,  that  whatsoever  the  pride  of  man 
may  design,  or  the  power  of  man  think  to  effect,  it  is  still 
the  providence  of  God  that  governs  the  world,  and  turneth 
all  the  affairs  thereof  which  way  soever  he  pleaseth. 

The  battle  of  Platsea  was  fought  in  the  morning,  and  that 
of  Mycale  in  the  afternoon  of  the  same  day  ;  and  yet  it  is  com- 
monly said  by  the  Greek  writers,''  that  they  iiad  an  account  of 
the  victory  of  Plataea  at  Mycale,  before  they  begun  the  battle 
there,  though  the  whole  iEgean  Sea,  which  was  several  days 
sailing,  lay  between.  But  Diodorus  Siculus  clears  this  mat- 
ter :  for  he  tells  us,  that  Leotychides,  finding  the  forces  that 
followed  him  to  be  in  great  pain  for  the  Greeks  at  Plataea, 
Je;st  they  should  be  overpowered  and  vanquished  by  the  nu 
merous  army  of  Mardonius,  the  better  to  encourage  and  en- 
hearten  his  men  for  the  battle,  just  before  he  made  the  first 
onset,  caused  it  to  be  given  out  throughout  all  the  army,  that 
the  Persians  were  defeated,  though  he  then  knew  nothing  of 
the  matter.'  But  what  he  then  feigned  happening  to  be  true, 
and  also  done  the  same  day,  this  gave  occasion  for  what  is 
said  of  that  quick  intelligence,  which  was  utterly  impossible 
to  have  come  in  so  short  a  time  from  so  far  distant  a  place  by 
any  human  means;  and  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose  a  mira- 
cle in  this  case.  And  that  which  is  said  of  the  victory  of 
Paulus  iEmilius  over  the  Macedonians  being  known  at  Rome 
on  the  same  day  on  which  it  was  got,  at  a  greater  distance 
than  Plataea  was  from  Mycale,  no  doubt,  was  from  (he  same 
cause.''  That  happened  to  be  true  which  was  only  feigned 
when  first  reported  ;  and  afterward,  when  it  was  found  to  be 

li  Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  11.     Herodotus,  lib.  9.     Justin,  lib.  2,  c.  14. 
i  Lib.  11-.  k  Flutart'hxis  in  Paulo  iT:niilio.-    Llvius,  lib.  41. 


34d  '  yK>EXIO.V  OF  THK  filblURY  OF  j  r.AKT  1- 

true,  and  done  on  the  same  day  on  which  the  Romans  lirst 
had  the  report,  it  was  made  a  miracle  of,  as  if  there  had  been 
some  supernatural    power  that  brought  the  intelligence. 

Xerxes,  on  his   having  received  thc<-c  two  great  defeats  at 
Plataea  and  INJycalc,  leflSardis  almost  with  the  same  precipi- 
tation as  he  did  Athens  after  the  battle  of  Salamis,  making  all 
the  haste  he  could  towards  I'ersia,  that  thereby  he  might  get 
as  far  as  he  could  out  of  the  reach  of  the  conquering  ene- 
mies.^    However,  he  omitted  not,  before  he  lelt  those  parts, 
to  give  order  for  the    burning  and    demolishing   of  all  the 
temples  in  the  Grecian  cities  in  Asia  ;""  w  hich  was  accordingly 
executed  upon  all  of  them,  excepting  only  that  of  Diana  at 
Ephesus,  which  alone  escaped  this  general  devastation.  And 
this  he  did,  not  out  of  any  particular  displeasure  to   the  Asi- 
atic Greeks;  for  he  did  the  same  wherever  else  he  came, 
destroying  all    idolatrous    temples    that    came    in  his    way, 
throughout  this  whole  expedition.  Tlie  true  cause  of  this  was 
his  zeal  for  the  Magian  religion,  in  which  he  had  been  thorough- 
ly instructed,  and  made  a  zealous  proselyte  to  it  by  Zoroas- 
tres  :  for  that  sect  expressing  a  great  detestation  against  wor- 
shipping of  God  by  images,  were  for  destroying  all  idola- 
trous  temples  wherever  they  came."     And  to  keep  Xerxes 
iirm  to  their  party,   not  only  several   of  the  chief  doctors 
of  the  Magians,  but   also   Oslanes'  himself,  who  was  then 
the  Archimagus,  or  great  patriarch  of  the  whole  sect,  ac- 
companied  him  as  his  chaplains   through  this  whole  expedi- 
tion :P  and  by  their  instigation,  Tully'^  tells  us,  it  was,  that 
all    these  temples  were  destroyed.     This  Ostanes  is  said  to 
have  been  grandfather  to  Zoroastrcs  •/  but  it  is  most   likely 
that  he  was  his  grandson,  and  that  it  was  by  mistake  that  it  hath 
been  said  otherwise  ;  for  Zoroastres,  it  is  certain,  was  a  very 
old  man  at  his  death. "^     The  name  of  Ostanes  was  very  fa- 
mous among  the  Greeks :  for  from  him,  they  say,   they  first 
had  the  Magian  philosopliy  ;^  he  having  communicated  it  unto 
them,  while  he  followed  Xerxes  in  this  war;  and  therefore 
from  him  they  sometimes  call  the  whole  sect  Ostaneans,"  in- 
stead of  jMagians,  as  if  he  had  been  the  chief  founder  of  it. 

One  of  the  temples,  which  by  Xerxes's  order  were  thus  de- 
stroyed, was  that  of  Apollo  Didumasan,  near  Miletus,  from 
whence  he  took  an  immense  treasure.'^     This  was  discovei- 

I  Herodot.  lib.  9.     Diodor.  Sic.  lib.  1  J. 

m  Sfrabo,  lib.  14,  p.  6.34.     Cicero  de    Lepibus,  lib.   2.     Hieronymus  in 
Esaiae,c.37.     j^^schybis  in  Persis.     Ilerodot.  lib.  8. 

II  Clemen.s  Aiexniid.  in  piotre|iticOj  Laerliiis  in  pro<Tmio.  Pocockii  spoci- 
snen  Historia3  Arabica;,  p.  14S,  1A[).  o  Piin.  lib.  30,  c.  1,  2. 

p  Laertius  in  proo;mii).     Siiida?  in  vore  i^ixyci.         tj  De  Legibii?,  lib.  2, 
i-  Religlo  vet.  Per?,  f.  21  t  Pliii.  lib.  30,  c.  1,  2. 

u  Suida?  in  '<*>^f:x».  \  .^tnibo.  lib.  M 


BOOK  IV. j       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.         3  41 

ed  to  the  Persians  by  the  Branchidas,  a  family  of  the  Mile- 
sians, that  had  the  keeping  of  the  temj)le  ;  who  thereon  find- 
ing themselves,  by  reason  of  this  treachery  and  sacrilege,  to 
be  become  very  odious  to  their  countrymen,  durst  not,  on 
Xerxes's  going  away,  stay  beliind,  for  fear  of  their  wrath,  but 
followed  after  him  into  Persia,  and  were  there  planted  by 
him  in  a  small  territory  which  he  gave  them,  on  the  river 
Oxus,  in  the  province  of  Bactria,  where  Alexander,  on  his 
making  himself  master  of  that  country,  hndiiig  their  posteri- 
ty still  remaining,  caused  tliem  all  to  be  put  to  the  sword, ^' 
thereby  cruelly  and  unreasonably  revenging,  on  (he  inno- 
cent descendants,  the  crime  committed  by  their  ancestors 
many  ages  before. 

Xerxes,  on^^is  return  towards  Susa,  passing  through  Baby- 
lon,^ made  there   the  same  devastation  of  their  temples  as 
he  had  in  Greece,  and  the  Lesser  Asia,  and,  as  it  may  be  sup- 
posed, on  the  same  principle,  that  is,  his  zeal  for  the  Magian 
religion,  and  his  aversion  to  that  of  the  Sabians,  who  worship- 
ped God  by  images."  of  which  the  Magians  had   the  utmost 
detestation  :  for  the  Babylonians  were  all  Sabians,  and  indeed 
were  the  tirst  founders  of  the  sect;  for  they  first  brought  in 
the   worship   of  the  planets,   and   afterwaid  that  of  images, 
and  from  thence  propagated  it  to  all  the  other  nations  where 
it  obtained  ;  as  hath  been  already  shown.     And  for  this  rea- 
son,   the    Magians,    having  them  in   abhoncnce,  above  all 
other  Sabians,  prevailed  with  Xerxes,  out  of  an  especial  ha- 
tred to  them,  to  take  Babylon  in  his  way  to  Susa,  of  purpose 
to  destroy  all  the  temples  they  had  there  ;  although  perchance 
to  recruit  Jiimself  with   the   spoils  of  these  temples,  after 
the  vast  expenses  which  he  had  been  at  in  his  Grecian  war. 
might  be  the  most  forcible  motive  that  wrought  him  into  this 
resolution  ;  for  the  wealth  of  their  temples  was  vast    and 
excessive,  as  having  been  the  collection  of  a  great  number 
of  ages.     I  have  already  computed  how  many  millions  of  our 
money  the  treasures  of  the  temple  o(  Belus  only  amounted 
to,   according   to    the   account  given   us  of  them    by  Dio- 
dorus  Siculus  ;  and  if  those  which  he  found  in  the  other  idol 
temples  in  that  city  were  as  great,  as  no  doubt  they  were, 
they  must  more  than  repay  him    for  all  that  he  spent  in  the 
Grecian  war.     And  without  some  such  recruit,    it   is  scarce 
possible  to  imagine,  how  he  could  have  supported  himself  at 
home,  after  so  great  a  miscarriage  and  loss.    And  yet  we  find, 
that,  after  his  return,  he  was  supported  through  all  his  empire, 

y  Strabo,  lib.  11,  p.  518.     Q.  Cuitius,  lib.  7,  c.5. 

z  Arrianus  Expeditioiiis  Alexandii,  lib.  7.     Strabo,  lib.  16.     Herodotus 
lib.  1.     Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  2. 

a  Pocockii  Specimen  Historian  Arabic;?,  p.  148. 149 


JH-^ 


^42  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OF  [PARI  I, 

in  the  same  manner  as  before,  without  suffering  any  great 
damage  either  in  his  authority  or  power  therein,  after  this  so 
great  and  so  extraordinary  a  disaster  ;  whereas  it  usually 
happens,  that  princes  are  ruined  at  home,  as  well  as  abroad, 
by  such  misfortunes. 

By  the  pillaging  and  destroying  of  all  these  heathen  temples 
at  Babylon,  was  fully  completed  what  the  prophets  Jsaiah 
and  Jeremiah  prophesied  hereof  many  years  before  :  "  All 
the  graven  images  of  her  gods  hath  he  broken  to  the 
ground.'"'  ''  I  will  punish  Bel  in  Babylon.  I  will  bring 
forth  out  of  his  mouth  that  which  he  hath  swallowed.""^ 
*'  And  I  will  do  judgment  upon  all  the  graven  images  of  Baby- 
lon-"'' "  Bel  is  confounded,  Merodach  is  broken  in  pieces  ; 
her  idols  are  confounded,  her  images  are  broken  in  pieces.'*^ 
For  when  Xerxes  destroyed  all  these  temples  in  Babylon, 
he  took  from  them  all  their  treasures,  which  they  had  been 
for  many  ages  swallowing  ;  and  pulling  down  all  the  images 
that  were  in  them,  broke  them  all  to  pieces,  and  converted 
the  gold  and  silver  of  which  they  were  made,  to  all  those 
common  uses  for  which  he  had  occasion  for  them. 

After  the  battle  of  Mycale,  the  Grecian  fleet  sailed  to  the 
Hellespont,  to  seize  the  bridges  which  Xerxes  had  laid  over 
those  straits,  supposing  that  they  had  been  still  whole. '"^ 
But  on  their  coming  hither,  finding  that  they  had  been  bro- 
ken by  storms,  Leotychides,  with  the  Peloponnesians,  sail- 
ed home  ;  but  Xantippus,  with  the  Athenians  and  allies  of 
Ionia,  still  staying  there,  made  themselves  masters  of  Sestus, 
and  the  Thracian  Chersonesus ;  where  they  took  much  spoil, 
and  a  great  number  of  prisoners,  and  then  on  the  approach  of 
winter,  returned  to  their  respective  cities.  Xantippus  finding 
all  the  materials  of  Xerxes's  bridge  at  Cardia,  where  the  Per- 
sians had  caused  them  to  be  brought  before  his  arrival  in  those 
parts,  he  carried  them  with  him  to  Athens,  and  there  laid 
them  up  to  be  a  memorial  of  that  total  overthrow  which  the}' 
gave  their  enemy  in  this  war,  by  the  many  victories  which 
they  had  obtained  over  them.  From  this  time  all  the  Ionian 
cities  in  Asia  revolted  from  the  Persians,  and  entering  into 
a  confederacy  with  the  (irecians,  by  their  help,  maintained 
their  liberty  for  the  most  part  ever  after,  during  the  continu- 
ance of  that  empire. 

The  Greeks,  having  settled  their  affliirs  at  home,  after  the 

great  ruffle   that  was  made  in  them  by  the  late  inva- 

XeriMft  sion  of  the  Persians,"    resolved  farther  to  prosecute 

the  war  against  them,  for  the  driving  of  them  out  of 

all  the  cities  abroad  that  were  of  the  Grecian  original.     For 

bisa.  xxi.  9.  c  Jer.  li.  44.  d  Jer.  li.  47.  52.  e  Jer.  1.  2. 

*  Herodot.  lib.  9.  g  Diod.  Sic.  lib.  11.     Plnlardm?  in  Aristide. 


BOOK  IV.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMii.VT.-5.  343 

which  purpose  they  equipped  a  strong  fleet,  of  which  Pausa- 
iiias,  kiug  of  the  Lacedaemonians  ;  and  Aristides,  the  Athe- 
nian, having  the  command,  they  sailed  with  it  to  Cyprus; 
and  there  having  freed  a  great  many  Grecian  cities  from 
their  Persian  garrisons,  restored  them  again  to  their  own 
liberty. 

About  this  time,  Xerxes  at  Susa  was  acting  a  very  cruel 
and  barbarous  tragedy  in  the  house  of  Masistes  his  brother, 
which  had  its  rise  from  an  incestuous  love  first  begun  at  Sar- 
dis  :''  for  Xerxes,  after  his  return  thither  from  his  flight  out 
of  Greece,  fell  in  love  with  Masistes's  wife,  who  was  then 
in  that  city  ;  but  she  being  a  very  virtuous  woman,  and  very 
loving  and  faithful  to  her  husband,  could  on  no  solicitations 
be  prevailed  with  to  defile  his  bed.  But  Xerxes,  thinking  to 
win  her,  at  last  heaped  all  manner  of  favours  and  obligations 
upon  her,  to  engage  her  to  yield  to  him  ;  and  particularly 
he  married  a  daughter  which  she  had,  named  Artaynta,  to 
Darius  his  eldest  son,  whom  he  intended  for  his  successor  in 
the  throne,  and,  on  his  return  to  Susa,  caused  the  marriage 
to  be  consummated  :  which  being  the  greatest  favour  he 
could  bestow  upon  the  mother,  he  expected  it  would  engage 
her  to  a  compliance  with  his  desires.  But  finding  the  lady's 
virtue  to  be  still  impregnable  against  all  his  attempts,  he  at 
length  turned  the  amour  from  the  mother  to  the  daughter, 
and  fell  in  love  with  Artaynta;  where  he  soon  found  a  ready 
compliance  to  all  he  desired.  While  this  was  doing,  Ha- 
mestris,  Xerxes's  queen,  having  wrought  a  very  rich  and  cu- 
rious mantle,  presented  it  to  the  king  ;  who  being  very  much 
pleased  with  it,  wore  it  when  he  made  his  next  visit  to  his 
mistress,  and,  on  his  having  enjoyed  his  lust  on  her,  to  ex- 
press the  satisfaction  he  had  therein,  he  bade  her  ask  what 
she  would  of  him  for  her  reward,  promising  her  with  an  oath, 
that  whatsoever  it  should  be,  he  would  give  it  unto  her. 
Hereon  she  asked  of  him  the  mantle  which  he  had  then  on 
him.  Xerxes,  being  aware  of  the  mischief  which  might  fol- 
low from  his  giving  of  it  unto  her,  did  all  that  he  could  to 
divert  her  from  this  request,  offering  her  whatever  else  was 
in  his  power  to  redeem  it  from  her.  But  nothing  else  being 
able  to  content  the  lady,  and  his  promise,  and  the  oath  being 
urged  for  the  grant,  he  was  forced  to  give  it  unto  her,  and  she, 
out  of  the  vanity  and  pride  of  her  mind,  as  soon  as  she  had  it, 
put  it  on,  and,  as  by  way  of  trophy,  wore  it  publicly  ;  whereby 
flamestris,  being  thoroughly  confirmed  in  what  she  was  afore 
only  jealous  of,  became  enraged  to  the  utmost  degree  ;  but  in- 
stead of  turning  her  wrath  against  the  daughter,  who  only  was 

ii  Herodofu?,  lib.  9. 


o4  i  CO.NWtXION  OF  THE  HlSiOKV    Of  [PARf  i. 

iluilty  ill  lliia  matter,  resolved  to  be  revenged  on  the  mothei-, 
as  if  all  this  intrigue  had  been  of  her  contrivance,  who  waa 
Avholiy  innocent  of  it.  And  therefore  waiting  the  great  fes- 
tival that  nsed  annnally  to  be  celebrated  on  the  king's 
birthday,  which  was  then  approaching,  whereon  it  was  the 
custom  for  the  king  to  grant  her  whatsoever  she  should  then 
desire,  she  asked  of  him  the  wife  of  Masistes  to  be  given 
unto  her.  The  king  perceiving  the  malice  of  the  woman, 
and  what  she  intended,  abhorred  it  to  the  utmost,  both  for 
the  sake  of  his  brother,  and  also  for  what  he  knew  of  the 
innocency  of  the  lady,  as  to  that  for  which  Hamestris  was 
exasperated  against  her  ;  and  therefore  at  first  withstood  her 
in  this  request  all  that  he  could.  But  her  importunity  not 
being  to  be  diverted,  nor  what  was  said  for  the  custom  to  be 
gainsayed,  he  was  forced  to  yield  to  her.  Whereon  the 
lady  being  seized  by  the  king's  guards,  and  delivered  to  her, 
she  caused  her  breasts,  her  tongue,  nose,  ears,  and  lips,  to 
be  cut  otf,  and  thrown  to  the  dogs  before  her  face,  and  then 
sent  her  home  again  thus  mangled  to  her  husband's  house- 
In  the  interim,  Xerxes,  to  mollit'y  the  matter  as  much  as  he 
could,  sent  for  Masistes,  and  told  him,  that  it  was  his  desire 
that  he  must  part  with  his  wife,  and  that  instead  of  her,  he 
would  give  him  one  of  his  daughters  in  marriage.  But  Ma- 
sistes, having  an  entire  affection  for  his  wife,  could  not  be  in- 
duced to  consent  hereto  :  whereon  Xerxes  told  him,  in  an 
an^ry  manner,  that,  since  he  refused  to  accept  of  his  daugh- 
ter, when  offered  to  him,  he  should  neither  have  her  nor  his 
wife  either  ;  and  so  dismissed  him  in  displeasure.  Whereon 
Masistes,  suspecting  some  mischief  was  done  him,  made 
haste  home  to  see  how  matters  there  stood ;  where  finding 
his  wife  in  that  mangled  condition  as  hath  been  mentioned, 
and  being  thereby  exasperated  to  the  utmost,  as  the  case  de- 
served, he  immediately  got  together  all  his  family,  servants, 
and  dependents,  and  made  all  the  haste  he  could  towards 
Bactria,  the  province  of  which  he  was  governor;  purposing 
as  soon  as  ho  should  arrive  thither,  to  raise  an  army,  and 
make  war  upon  the  king,  to  be  revenged  of  him  for  this  bar- 
barous usage.  But  Xerxes,  hearing  of  his  sudden  retreat, 
and  suspecting  from  thence  what  he  intended,  sent  a  party  of 
horse  after  him,  who,  overtakii^  him  on  the  road,  cut  him 
otf,  with  his  wife  and  children,  and  all  that  belonged  to  him. 
This  Masistes  was  brother  of  Xerxes  by  Atossa  the  same  mo- 
ther, as  well  as  by  the  same  father,  and  was  a  person  of  great 
worth  and  honour,  as  well  as  of  great  fidelity  to  the  king; 
and  he  had  done  him  great  services  in  his  Grecian  war,  hav- 
ing been  one  of  his  chief  generals,  who  had  the  leading  of 
his  army  in  that  expedition  ;  and  he  was  personally  engaged 


nOOK  IV.]     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  345 

for  him  in  the  battle  of  IMycaic,  and  was  in  trutli  the  chief 
honour  of  his  house,  and  never  gave  him  any  just  cause  to 
be  offended  with  him.  However,  all  this  could  not  protect 
him  from  Xerxes's  cruelty ;  which  sufficiently  shows,  that, 
where  there  is  a  vicious  prince,  with  an  arbitrary  power  in 
the  government,  there  is  nothing  that  can  be  sufficient  to  se- 
cure any  man's  safety  under  him. 

And  there  is  another  fact  related  of  Hnmestris,  equalij 
cruel  and  impious  ;  that  is,  that  she  caused  fourteen  boys  of 
the  bestJamilies  in  Persia  to  be  buried  alive,  as  a  sacrifice 
to  the  inrehial  gods.'  And,  in  the  relating  of  this,  as  well 
as  her  other  cruelties  above  mentioned,  1  have  been  the 
more  particular,  because  several  having  been  of  opinion,  by 
reason  of  the  similitude  that  is  between  the  names  of  Ha- 
mestris  and  Esther,  that  Xerxes  was  the  Ahasucrus,  and 
Hamestris  the  Esther,  mentioned  in  Scripture,'^  it  may  from 
hence  appear,  how  impossible  it  is,  that  a  woman  of  so  vile 
and  abominable  a  character,  as  Hamestris  was,  could  have 
ever  been  that  qu(?t3n  of  Persia,  who,  by  the  name  of  Esther, 
is  so  renowned  in  holy  writ,  and  is  there  recorded  as  the 
instrument  by  whom  God  was  pleased,  in  so  signal  a  marmer, 
to  deliver  his  people  from  that  utter  destruction  which  was 
designed  against  them. 

After  the  death  of  IMasistes,  Xerxes  appointed  Hystas- 
pes,'  his  second  son,  to  be  governor  of  Bactria  in  his  stead- 
which  obliging  him  to  be  absent  from  Court,  gave  Arlaxerxes, 
his  younger  brother,  the  opportunity  of  mounting  the  throne 
before  him,  on  the  death  of  Xerxes,  as  will  be  hereafter 
related. 

The  Grecian  fleet,  having  effected  at  Cyprus  what  thev 
went  thither  for,"^  sailed  from  thence  to  the  Helles- 
pont, and  took  in  Byzantium  ;  where  several  Persians  x^^^xi's^ia 
of  eminent  note,  and  some  of  them  of  the  kindred  of 
Xerxes,  being  taken  prisoners,  Pausanias  treacherously  re- 
leased them  all,  pretending  they  had  made  their  escape,  and 
by  some  ofthem  entered  into  a  treaty  with  Xerxes  to  betray 
Greece  unto  him,  upon  condition  that  he  would  give  him 
one  of  his  daughters  in  marriage  ;  which  being  readily 
agreed  to  by-  Xerxes,  Pausanias  thenceforth  took  upon  him 
to  live  after  another  rate  than  formerly,  alFecting  the  porrip 
and  grandeur  bf  the  Persians,  and  carrying  himseUMiaughiiiy 
and  tyrannically  towards  the  allies  :  whereon,  they  being 
disgusted  with  his  conduct,  and  n.ot  being  able  any  longer  to 
bear  it,  did  put'themselves  under  the  Athenians,  who,  thcnce- 

i  Herodotus,  lib.  7.  k  Scaliger  and  his  followers. 

1  Diodorus  Siculiis,  lib.  11. 

in  Thucj'dides,  lib.  1.    Diodor.  Sic.  lib.  11.     Plutarclius  in  Aristide, 
Vol.   1.  44 


3\&  COyXEXlON  OP  'i'HK  HISTORY  OF  [pARl   J. 

forih.  by  this  means,  obtained  the  chief  command  at  sea  in 
all  the  Grecian  atTairs,  and  held  it  for  many  years  after. 
The  Laccdtemonians,  having  received  an  account  of  these 
miscarriages  of  Pausanias,  deposed  him  from  his  command 
on  the  llcllc&pont,  and  rocaUing  him  home,  put  him  under 
pubhc  censure  for  them. 

However,  the  next  year  he  went  again  to  the  Hellespont," 
although  witliout  the  consent  of  the  state,  or  any 
Xerxes^n!  commiasiou  from  them,  sailing  thither  in  a  private 
ship,  which  he  hired  on  pretence  of  lighting  against 
the  Persians  as  a  volunteer  in  that  war,  but  in  reality  to  carry 
on  his  treasonable  designs  with  them,  Artabazus  being  ap- 
pointed governor  on  the  Propontis  of  purpose  to  be  tlicre  at 
hand  to  treat  with  him.  But  while  he  was  at  Byzantium, 
his  behaviour  was  such,  (hat  the  Athenians  drove  him  thence; 
whereon  he  went  to  the  country  of  Troas,  and  there  tarried 
some  time,  the  better  to  carry  on  his  correspondence  with 
Artabazus;  of  which,  there  being  some  suspicions,  the 
Lacedasmonians  summoned  him  home  by  a  public  olHcer, 
and,  on  his  return,  put  him  in  prison;  but  no  evidence  ap- 
pearing of  this  thing  in  his  trial,  he  was  again  discharged. 
But  some  time  after,  the  whole  of  it  being  brought  to  light, 
and  discovered  by  one  whom  he  had  made  use  of  to  carry 
on  the  correspondence,  they  put  him  to  death  for  it. 

Themistocles,  °by  his  wisdom  and  great  application,  hav- 
ing much  advanced  the  power  and  interest  of  the 
Xerxes^H.  Athenians,  thereby  drew  on  him  the  bitter  enmity 
of  the  Lacedagmonians  :  for  they,  seeing  their  honour 
eclipsed,  and  that  authority,  whereby  they  had  hitherto 
borne  the  chief  sway  among  the  Greeks,  now  rivalled  and 
diminished  by  the  growing  up  of  that  flourishing  state,  could 
not  with  patience  bear  it;  and  therefore,  to  gratify  their 
revenge,  resolved  on  the  ruin  of  him  that  had  been  the 
author  of  it.  In  order  whereto,  they  caused  him  first  to  be 
accused  at  Athens,  of  being  a  confederate  with  Pausanias  in 
his  treason  against  Greece  ;  but  nothing  being  proved  of 
what  was  laid  to  his  charge,  he  was  there  acquitted. 

But  the  next  year  afler,   Themistocles    being  banished 
Athens,  they  renewed  their  design  against  him.^    He 
xerxes^is.  ^^^^  ^^^^  banished  for  any  crime,  but  by  ostracism  ; 
which  was  a  way  among  them,  whereby,  for  the  bet- 
ter securing  of  their  liberty,  they  used  to  suppress  those  that 

n  Thucydides,  lib.  1.  Plutarchus  in  Aristide  k.  Themistocle.  Cornelius 
Nepos  in  fausania. 

o  Herodotus,  lib.  7,  &,c.  Thucydides,  lib.  i.'  Plutarchus  in  Themistocle. 
Diodor.  Sic.  lib    11. 

p  Thucydides,  lib.  1.    Plutarchus  in  Themistocle.    Diodor.  Sic.  lib.  11, 

4  Plutarchus  in  Aristide. 


KOOK  IV.]  THE  OLU  Ai\i>  NEW  XKiT A.MEXT5.  3-17 

were  grown  to  too  great  a  power  and  authority  among  them, 
by  banishing  them  from  the  city  for  a  certain  term  of  years. "^ 
Themistocles  being  thus  necessitated  for  a  time  to  leave  hi? 
country,  settled  at  Argos  ;  of  which  the  Lacedasmonians 
taking  the  advantage,  prosecuted  anew  their  charge  against 
him  before  the  general  council  of  all  Greece,  then  met  at 
Sparta,  and  summoned  him  to  appear  before  them  to  answer 
to  it,  accusing  him  there  of  treason  against  the  whole  com- 
munity of  Greece.  Themistocles  seeing  how  bitterly  the 
Lacedaemonians  were  set  against  him,  and  knowing  that 
they  could  carry  every  thing  as  they  pleased  in  that  assembly, 
durst  not  trust  his  cause  with  them,  but  lied  lirst  to  Corcyra, 
and  from  thence  to  Admetus,  king  of  the  Molossians,  by 
whose  assistance  being  conveyed  to  the  coasts  of  the  iEgeau 
Sea,  he  took  shipping  at  Pydna  in  Macedonia,  and  from 
thence  passed  over  to  Cyma,  a  city  of  JBoli  in  the  Lesser 
Asia.  But  Xerxes  having  put  a  price  of  two  hundred  ta- 
lents upon  his  head,  (which  amounted  to  thirty-seven  thou- 
sand live  hundred  pounds  of  our  money,)  several  were  there 
upon  the  hunt  after  him  for  the  gain  of  so  great  a  reward. 
For  the  avoiding  of  this  danger,  he  was  forced  there  to  lie 
hid  for  some  time  ;  tillat  length,  by  the  contrivance  and  as- 
sistance of  his  friend  and  host  Nicogenes,  the  lichest  man  of 
that  country,  he  was  conveyed  safe  to  Susa,  in  one  of  those 
close  chariots,  in  which  the  Persians  used  to  carry  their 
women  ;  they  that  had  the  conducting  of  him  giving  out, 
that  they  were  carrying  a  young  Greek  lady  to  the  court  for 
one  of  the  nobility  ;  by  which  means  he  got  to  the  Persian 
court  without  any  danger  :  where,  being  arrived,  he  address- 
ed himself  to  Artabanus,  the  captain  of  the  guards,  to  whose 
othce  it  belonged  to  bring  those  to  the  audience  of  the  king 
that  had  any  business  with  him  :  by  him  he  was  introduced 
into  Xerxes's  presence  ;  and  being  there  asked  who  he  was, 
lie  told  him  he  was  Themistocles  the  Athenian  ;  that  though 
lie  had  done  him  great  hurt  in  his  wars,  yet,  he  had  in  many 
things  much  served  him,  particularly  in  hindering  tiie  Greeks 
from  pursuing  him  after  the  battle  of  Salamis,  and  obstruct- 
ing his  retreat  over  the  Hellespont ;  that,  t"oi'  these  his  ser- 
vices to  hit-,  being  driven  out  of  his  country,  he  was  now 
tied  to  him  for  refuge,  hoping  that  he  would  have  more  re- 
gard to  what  he  had  done  for  his  interest,  than  to  what,  with 
the  rest  of  his  countrymen,  he  had  in  the  wars  acted  against 
it.  Xerxes  then  said  nothing  to  him  ;  though  as  soon  aa 
he  was  withdrawn,  he  expressed  a  great  deal  of  joy  and  sa- 
tisfaction, that  so  considerable  a  person  was  come  over  to 
him,  wishing  that  God  would  always  put  it  into  the  minds  of 


348  CONNEXION    OF   THE   HISTORY    OF  [PART  1. 

}»is  enemies  thus  to  drive  their  best  men  from  them.  But 
the  next  morning  having  assembled  the  chief  of  the  Persian 
nobihty  about  him,  and  ordered  him  again  to  be  brought  into 
his  presence,  he  received  liim  with  great  kindness  ;  telling 
him  in  the  tirst  place,  that  he  owed  him  two  hundred  talents; 
for  he  having  set  that  price  upon  his  head,  it  was  due  to  him 
who  had  brought  him  his  head,  by  thus  surrendering  himself 
unto  him  ;  and  accordingly  commanded  it  to  be  paid  him  : 
and  then  ordered  him  to  say  what  he  had  concerning  the 
affairs  of  Greece  to  impart  unto  him.  But  Thcmistocles, 
being  then  no  otherwise  able  to  deliver  himself  than  by  an 
interpreter,  begged  leave  that  he  might  be  permitted  first  to 
learn  the  Persian  language  ;  hoping  that  then  he  might  be 
in  a  capacity  to  commuRicate  to  the  king  what  he  had  to 
impart  to  him  in  a  much  more  perfect  manner,  than  he  could 
then  promise  to  do  by  the  interpretation  of  another  :  which 
being  granted  to  him,  and  having,  after  a  year's  time,  made 
himself  thorough  master  of  that  tongue,  he  was  again  called 
in  to  the  king  ;  to  whom  having  communicated  all  that  he 
thought  proper,  he  grew  very  much  into  his  favour,  so  that 
when  Mandana  his  sister,  who  had  lost  several  of  her  sons 
in  the  battle  of  Salamis,  had  prosecuted  an  accusation 
against  Themistoclcs  for  their  death,  and  was  very  importu- 
nate and  clamorous  to  have  him  delivered  up  to  her  a  sacri- 
fice to  her  revenge,  he  not  only  caused  him  to  be  acquitted 
by  the  suffrages  of  all  the  nobility  then  attending  the  court, 
but  conferred  many  royal  bounties  upon  him  ;  for  he  gave 
him  a  wife  of  a  noble  Persian  family,  with  an  house,  ser- 
vants, and  an  equipage  in  all  things  suitable  hereto,  and  an 
annual  revenue,  sutlicient  to  enable  him  in  the  best  manner 
to  support  the  same,  and  on  all  occasions,  much  caressed 
him  as  long  as  he  continued  in  his  court.  And  it  is  men- 
tioned as  one  particular  instance  of  his  favour  to  him,  that 
by  his  especial  command,  he  was  admitted  to  hear  the  lec- 
tures and  discourses  of  the  Magians,  and  was  instructed  by 
them  in  all  the  secrets  of  their  philosophy.'  But  at  length, 
it  being  thought  best  for  the  king's  interest,  that  he  should 
reside  in  some  of  the  maritime  towns  near  Greece,  that  he 
might  be  there  ready  at  hand  for  such  services  as  the  king 
might  have  occasion  of  from  him  in  those  parts,  he  was  sent 
to  live  at  Magnesia,  on  the  river  Meander  ;  where  he  had 
not  only  all  the  revenues  of  that  city  (which  were  fifty  ta- 
lents a  year,)  but  also  those  of  Myus  and  Lampsacus  allowed 
him   for  his     maintenance,   amounting   altogether   to    one 

r  riutarcbus  in  Tbemistocle- 


UOOK  IV.]     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  349 

hundred  and  fifty  talents  a  year,  which  was  little  less  than 
thirty  thousand  pounds  sterling.  And  here  he  lived  all  the 
time  of  Xerxes,  and  several  years  after,  in  the  reign  of  Ar- 
taxerxes  his  son,  in  a  very  plentiful  and  splendid  manner,  as 
well  he  might  on  so  large  a  revenue,  till  at  length  he  ended 
his  days  in  ttiat  city  in  the  manner  as  siiail  be  hereafter  re- 
lated. 

But,  according  to  Thucydides,^  Xerxes  was  dead,  and  Ar- 
taxerxes  had  newly  succeeded  in  the  throne,  when  Themis- 
tocles  fled  out  of  Greece  to  the  Persian  court ;  and  therefore 
he  tells  us  that  it  was  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  and  not  Xer- 
xes, by  whom  Themistocles  was  received  with  so   much  fa- 
vour ;  and  Thuc}dides  being  an  historian  of  great  credit,  and 
having  wrote  this  not  many  years  after  the  death  of  Artaxer- 
xes,* (he  lord  primate  Usher,  moved  b}  so  great  an  authority, 
follows  him  in  this  matter,  and,  to  mai<e  it  accord  with  the 
other  transactions  of  those  times,  takes  nine  years  from  the 
reign  of  Xerxes,  and  adds  them  to  the  following  reigns,  making 
Xerxes,  to  end  his  reign  nine  years  sooner,  and  Artaxerxes 
to  begin  his  reign  nine  years  sooner,  than  any  other  author 
says."     Hereb}  the  learned   primate  doth  exceedingly  help 
his  hypothesis  of   the  computation  of  ihe  seventy   weeks  of 
Daniel's  prophec)  ;  and  that,  no  doubt,  ii  duced  him  to  pre- 
fer the  authority  of  Thucydides  before  all  others  in  this  par- 
ticular.    For  if  we  put  the   twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes 
Longimanus  (from  whence  he  reckons  the  Ixginning  of  these 
seventy  weeks,)  nine  years  higher  than  otherr- do,  the  middle 
of  the  last  week  will  fail  exactly  in  with  the  time  when  Christ 
was  crucitied.     And  therefore,  were  the  aullurity  of  Thucy- 
dides sufficient  to  juslily  hirn   in  tins  nsiile     the  primate's 
computation   would  appear  much  more  piausii  le  than  now 
it  doth.     But  the  canon  of  Ptolemy,  Diodorus  Sicuhis,  Plu- 
tarch, Africanus,  Eusebiu«,''and  ail  others  that  write  of  these 
times,  being  against  him  herein,  it  is  much  more  probable, 
that  Thucydides  v\'as  out  in  this  particular;  for  although  he 
be  a  very  exact  historian   in  the  affiiirs  of  Greece,  of  which 
he  professedly  writes,  yet  it  is  possible  he  might  be  mistaken 
in  those  of  Persia,  which  he  treats  of  only  by  the  by. 

In  the  interim,  the  Athenians,  having  sent  out  a  fleet  under 
the  command  of  Cimon,>'  the  son  of  Miltiades,  conquered 
Eione,  on  the  river  Str^mon,  and  other  parts  of  Thrace,  and 
then  took  in  the  islands  of  Scyrus  arid  Naxus,  which  had  re- 

s  Lib.  1.  t  In  Annai.  vet.  Testamenii  sub  anno  Juliana?  Period!,  4241. 

u  That  is,  to  the  reigns  of  Artaxerxes  and  his  son  Xerxes,  whom  tlie  pri- 
mafe  makes  to  reign  one  year  after  him. 

X  For  these  authors  say,  that  Xerxes  reigned  t%venty-one  years,  and  Ar- 
taxerxes forty-one.  But  according  to  the  primate,  Xerxes  reigned  hut 
twelve  years,  and  Artaxerxes  fifty. 


3a0  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

volted  from  them  :  and,  while  they  were  assaulting  the  last  of 
these,  Thcinistoclcs  passed  by  them,  in  his  flight  into  Asia, 
and  dilHciiltly  escaped  falhng  into  their  hands. ^ 

The  next  year  after,  Cimon,  sailing  from  Athens  with  a  fleet 
of  two  hundred  sail,  passed  over  to  the  coast  of  Asia  ; 
xtrles*™'.  where,  having  angumented  it  with  one  hundred  sail 
more  from  the  allies,  he  took  in  all  the  maritime 
parts  of  Caria  and  Lycia,  driving  the  Persians  out  of  all 
the  cities  they  were  possessed  of  in  those  parts  ;  and  then 
hearing  that  they  had  a  great  fleet  on  the  coast  of  Pamphylia, 
and  were  also  drawing  down  thilher  as  great  an  army  by  land 
for  some  expedition,  he  hastened  thither  with  two  hundred 
and  hfty  of  his  best  ships  in  quest  of  them  ;  and  finding  their 
fleet,  consisting  of  three  hundred  and  fifty  sail,  at  anchor  in 
the  inoulh  of  the  river  Euryniedon,  and  their  land  army  en- 
camped on  the  shore  by,  he  lirsl  assaulted  their  fleet  ;^  which 
being  soon  put  to  the  rout,  and  having  no  other  way  to  fly  but 
up  the  river,  were  all  taken,  every  ship  of  them,  and  twenty 
thousand  men  in  them,  the  rest  either  having  escaped  to  land, 
or  been  slain  in  the  fight.  Alter  this,  while  his  forces  were  thus 
flushed  with  success,  he  put  them  ashore,  and  fdlon  the  land 
army,  and  overthrew  the<nalso  with  a  greatslaughter;  where- 
by he  got  two  great  victories  in  the  same  day,  of  which  one 
was  equal  to  that  of  Salamis,  and  the  other  to  that  of  Plataea. 
And  having  gotten  information,  that  there  were  eighty  more 
Piioenician  shp^  coming  to  join  the  Persian  fleet,  he  surprised 
them  in  the  harbour,  before  they  had  any  notice  of  the  late 
defeat,  and  destroyed  every  ship  of  them  ;  and  all  the  men 
on  board  were  either  drowned  or  slain  in  the  fight.  After 
which  success,  Cimon  returned  home  in  great  triumph,  and 
very  much  enriched  and  adorned  Athens  with  the  spoils  got 
in  this  expedition. 

The  next  yt;ar  Cimon  sailed  to  the  Hellespont,''  and,  falling 
on  the  Persians,  who  had  taken  possession  of  the 
xersefn.  Tluaciau  Chcrsonesus,  diove  them  out  thence,  and 
subjected  their  country  again  to  the  Athenians ; 
though  ill  truth  (it  having  been  the  principality  of  his  father 
Miltiades)  ho  had  the  best  right  to  it  himseh>  After  this  he 
subdued  the  Thracians,  who  had  revolted  from  the  Athe- 
nians, and  then,  landing  his  army  on  the  op[)ositc  shore  of 
Thrace,  he  seized  all  the  gold  mines  on  those  coasts,  and 
brought  under  liim  all  that  country  as  far  as  Macedon,  and 
thereby  opened  a  way  for  the  conquering  of  that  realm  also, 

y  Diodoras  Siciilus,  lib.  11.     P'.utarchus  in  Cimone. 
i,  Plntarclius  in  'f  hemistocle. 

a  Diodorus  el  Pintarchus,  ibid.     Tbucydides.  lib.  1. 
b  Flutarchus  in  Cimone.  c  llerodotusj  lib.  C 


BOOK  IV.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  351 

0 

would  he  have  pursued  the  opportunity  :  for  the  omitting  of 
which,  he  was  afterward,  on  his  return,  brought  to  trial  for 
his  life  before  the  Athenians,  as  if  he  had  been  corrupted  by 
the  Macedonians  to  spare  them,  and  hardi)  escapt-d  being 
condemned  for  it.'' 

Xerxes,  being  at  last  daunted  and  wholly  discouraged  by 
the  continued  scries  of  so  many  losses  and  dehats,  gave  over 
all  thoughts  of  any  longer  carrying  on  the  Grecian  war;  and 
therefore,  from  this  time,  no  more  of  his  ships  were  seen  in 
the  iEgean  Sea,  or  any  of  his  forces  on  the  coasts  adjoining 
to  it,  all  the  remainder  of  his  reign. ^ 

After  this,  Xerxes  giving  himself  wholly  up  to  luxury  and 
ease,  minded  nothing  but  the  gratif)ing  of  his  plea- 
sures and  his  lusts  ;  whereby  growing  into  contempt  -tekJii. 
with  the  people,  Artabanus,  the  captain  of  his  guards, 
and  one  who  had  been  long  in  prime  favour  and  authority 
with  him,  conspired  against  him,  and  having  drawn  iMithri- 
dates,  one  of  his  eunuchs  that  was  his  chamberlajn,  into  the 
plot,  by  his  means  got  into  his  bed  chamber,  and  there  slew 
him,  while  he  slept  in  his  bed  ;  and  then  going  to  Artaxerxes, 
his  third  son,  acquainted  him  of  the  murder,  and  accused 
Darius,  his  elder  brother,  to  be  the  author  of  it,  telling  him, 
that  it  was  done  to  make  his  way  to  the  throne  ;  that  it  was 
his  design  to  cut  him  off  next  to  secure  himself  in  it  ;  and 
that  therefore  it  behooved  him  to  look  to  himself. "^  \ll  which 
Artaxerxes,  as  being  Jhen  a  very  young  ma^i,  rashly  believ- 
ing, without  any  farther  examination,  to  be  true,  and  being 
irritated  thereby  in  such  a  manner  as  Artabanus  intended, 
went  immediately  to  his  brother's  apartment,  and  there,  by 
the  assistance  of  Artabanus  and  his  guards,  slew  him  also. 
And  this  he  did,  as  he  thought,  by  way  of  just  revenge  for  the 
death  of  his  father,  and  for  the  securing  of  his  own  safety,  be- 
ing imposed  on  and  deceived  by  the  craft  of  the  traitor,  who 
excited  him  hereto.  The  next  heir  was  Hystaspes,  the  second 
f^on  of  Xerxes;  but  he  being  absent  in  Bactna,  of  which 
province  he  was  governor,  Artabanus  took  Artaxerxes,  as  be- 
ing next  at  hand,  and  put  him  on  the  throne  ;  but  with  design 
to  let  him  sit  on  it  no  longer  than  till  he  had  formed  a  party 
strong  enough  to  seize  it  for  himself.  He  having  been  long 
in  great  authority,  had  many  creatures,  and  he  had  also  seven 
sons,  all  grown  up  to  be  men  of  robust  bodies,  and  advanced 
to  great  dignities  in  the  empire  ;  and  his  confidence  in  these 
was  that  which  put  his  ambition  on  this  design  ;  but  while  he 
was  hastening  it  to  a  conclusion,  Artaxerxes,  having  got  a  full 
discovery  of  the  whole  plot,  by  the  means  of  Megabyzus,  who 

d  Plutarchus  in  Cimone.  e  Ibid. 

f  Ctesias.     Diodorus  Siculus,  lib,  11,     Justin,  lib.  3,  t.  1> 


^^^  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PAUT  I, 

had  married  one  of  his  sisters,  was  beforehand  willi  him  in  a 
counterplot,  and  cut  him  off  before  his  treason  was  fully  ri- 
pened  for  execution  ;  whereby  having  secured  himself  in 
thorough  possession  of  the  kingdom,  he  lield  it  forty-one 
years. 

He  is  said  to  have  been  the  handsomest  person  of  the  age 
in  which  he  lived,^  and  to  have  been  a  prince  of  a  very  mild 
and  generous  disposition  ;^  he  is  called  by  the  Greek  histo- 
rians MccK^ex'-t?^  or  Loiigimanus,  {i.  c.  the  long-handed}'  by 
reason  ol  ilic  nit)rf  than  ordiiuiry  length  of  his  hands;  for  they 
were  so  long,  that,  on  his  standing  upright,  he  could  touch 
his  knees  with  them.  But  in  Scripture  he  hath  the  name  of 
Ahasuerus,  as  well  as  that  of  Artajcerxes,  and  was  the  same 
who  had  Esther  for  his  queen.  1  acknowledge  there  are 
two  very  great  men,  whose  opinion  differ  from  me  herein, 
archbishop  Usher  and  Joseph  Scaliger. 

The  former''  holdeth  that  it  was  Darius  Hystaspes  that  was 
the  king  Ahasuerus  who   married   Esther;  and  that  Atossa 
was  the  Vashti,  and  Artystona  the  Esther  of  the  holy  Scrip- 
tures.     But  all  that  is  said  of  those  persons  by  the  historians 
who  have  written  of  them  is  wholly  inconsistent  herewith  : 
for  Herodotus    positivelly   tolls   us,  Irhat  Artystona  was  the 
daughter  of  Cyius,'  and  therefore  she  could  not  be  Esther  ; 
and  that  Atossa  had  four  sons  by  Darius,  besides  daughters, 
all  born  to  him  by  her  after  he  was  king  ;'"  and  therefore  she 
could  not  be  that  queen  Vashti,  who  was  divorced  from  the 
king  her  husband  in  the  third  year  of  his  reign,  nor  he  that 
Ahasuerus  that  divorced  her."     Furthermore,  Atossa  is  said 
to  have  had  that  predominant  interest  with   Darius  even  to 
the  time  of  his  death,  that  it  was  by  her  means  that  in  the 
last  act  of  his  life,"  he  was  influenced  to  settle  the  succession 
of  his  crown   on   Xerxes   her  son,  to  the  disinheriting  of  all 
his  elder  sons,  who  were  born   to   him   by  a  former  wife  ; 
whereas  the  Ahasuerus  of  the  book  of  Esther  had  removed 
Vashti  both  from  his  bed  and  from  his  presence  by  an  unal- 
terable decree  ;P  and  therefore  never  could  admit  her  again 
to  either  all  his  life  after.     That  which  chiefly  induced  the 
learned  archbishop  to  be  of  this  opinion   was,  that  whereas 
it  is  said  of  Ahasuerus  in  the  book  of  Esther,'^  that  he  laid  a 
tribute  upon  the  land,  and  upon  the   isles,"^  the  same  is  also 
said  of  Darius  Hystaspes   by   Herodotus;  and  therefore  he 
thought,  that  they  were  both  the  same  person.     But  Strabo, 

g  Strabo.  lib.  15,  p.  735.  h  Plutarch,  in  Artaxerxe  Mnemone. 

i  Plutarch,  et  .^trabo,  ib. 

k  In  Annalibus  veteris  Testament!,  sub  anno  J.  P.  4193. 

1  Herodot.  lib,  3.  et  lib.  7-  m  Herodot.  lib.  7,  sub  initio. 

n  Esther  i.  3.  o  Herodot.  lib.  7.  p  Esther  i.  If 

q  Chap.  X.  1.  r  Herodot.  lib.  3. 


BOOK  IV.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  353 

who  is  an  author  of  as  good,  if  not  better  credit,  attributeth 
this  to  Longimanus.^  It  must  be  acknowledged,  that  in  the 
printed  copies  which  we  now  have  of  that  author,  it  is  read 
Darius  Longimanus  in  the  place  which  I  refer  to.  But  the 
title  Longimanus,  and  the  description  of  the  person  after  in 
that  place  added,  can  belong  to  none  but  to  the  Artaxerxes 
whom  we  now  speak  of;  and  therefore  it  is  manifest,  that 
there  Darius  is  put  instead  of  Artaxerxes,  by  the  corruption 
of  the  text. 

Scaliger's  opinion  is,  that  Xerxes  was  the  Ahasuerus,  and 
Hamestris  his  queen,  the  Esther  of  the  holy  Scriptures.*^  His 
main  reason  for  it  is,  the  similitude  that  is  between  the  names 
of  Hamestris  and  Esther.  But  how  much  more  the  dissi- 
militude of  their  characters  proves  the  contrary,  hath  been 
already  shown  ;  and  what  will  be  hereafter  said  of  her  deal- 
ing with  Inarus  and  the  Greeks  taken  with  him  in  Egypt,  and 
her  frequent  adulteries,  will  be  a  farther  confirmation  of  it. 
Furthermore  it  appears  from  Herodotus,"  that  Xerxes  had  a 
son  by  Hamestris  that  was  marriageable  in  the  seventh  year  of 
his  reign  ;  and  therefore  it  is  impossible  she  could  be  Esther; 
for  Esther  was  not  married  to  Ahasuerus  till  the  seventh  year 
of  his  reign,  nor  could  possibly  have  been  taken  into  his  bed 
sooner  than  two  years  before.*^  For  according  to  the  sacred 
history, y  it  was  the  fourth  yeftr  of  Ahasuerus,  \vhen  the 
choice  of  virgins  was  made  for  him,  and  a  whole  )^ear  being 
employed  in  the  purifications,^  whereby  they  were  prepared 
for  his  bed,  she  could  not  be  called  thither  till  the  fifth  year 
of  his  reign  ;  and  therefore  the  sixth  was  the  soonest  that  she 
could  have  a  son  by  him.  Besides  Artaxerxes,  the  third  son 
of  Hamestris,^  being  grown  up  to  the  stajte  of  a  man  at  the 
death  of  his  father,  (which  happened  in  the  twenty-first  year 
of  his  reign)  he  must  have  been  born  before  the  sixth  year 
of  his  reign.  All  which  put  together,  do  sufficiently  prove, 
how  much  soever  the  names  Esther  and  Hamestris  may  be 
alike,  the  persons  could  not  be  the  same. 

But  there  being  no  such  objections  as  to  Artaxerxes  Lon- 
gimanus, it  is  most  probable  that  he  was  the  person.  The 
ancientest  and  best  evidences  that  can  be  had  of  this  matter, 
are  from  the  Greek  version  of  the  sacred  text,  called  the 
Septuagint,  the  apocryphal  additions  tothebook  of  Esther,  and 
Josephus  ;  and  all  these  agree  for  Artaxerxes  Longimanus. 
For  Josephus  positively  tells  us  it  was  he  ;^  and  the  Septua- 
gint, through  the  whole  book  of  Esther,  wherever  the  He- 
brew text  hath  Ahasuerus,  translate  Artaxerxes;  and  the 

s  Strabo,  lib.  15,  p.  735.  t  De  Emendatione,  lib.  6.         u  Lib.  9. 

X  Esther  ii.  16.  y  Esther  ii.  ;     z  Esther  ii.  12. 

a  Diod.  Sic.  lib.  11.  b  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  6. 
V©r>.  I.  45 


364         OLP  AjSD  ^'Ew  testaments  connected. 

apocryphal  additions  to  that  book  every  where  call  the  hus- 
band of  Estiier  Artaxerxes,  who  could  be  none  other  than 
Artaxerxes  Longimanus;  for  there  are  several  circumstances 
related  of  him,  both  in  the  canonical  and  apocryphal  Esther, 
which  can  by  no  means  be  applicable  to  the  other  Artaxer- 
xes, called  Mnemon.  And  Severus  Sulpitius,  and  many  other 
writers,  as  well  of  the  ancients  as  the  moderns,  come  also  into 
this  opinion.  And  the  extraordinary  favour  and  kindness 
which  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  showed  the  Jews,  beyond  all 
the  other  kings  that  reigned  in  Persia,  first  in  sending  Ezra, 
and  after,  Nehemiah,  for  the  repairing  of  the  broken  affairs 
of  that  people  in  Judah  and  Jerusalem,  and  the  restoring  of 
them  again  to  their  ancient  prosperity,  is  what  can  scarce  be 
accounted  for  on  any  other  reason,  but  that  they  had  in  his 
bosom  such  a  powerful  advocate  as  Esther  to  solicit  for  them.*" 
But  these,  and  the  other  transactions  of  this  king,  will  be 
the  subject  of  the  next  ensuing  book. 


c  There  were  two  other  kings  of  Persia,  that  showed  kindness  to  the 
Jews,  Cyrus  and  Darius  Hystaspes.  Each  of  them  granted  a  decree  in  fa- 
vour of  the  Jevrs  :  but  Artaxerxes  went  beyond  them  both  ;  for  he  granted 
two  decrees,  by  virtue  of  which  both  the  ecclesiastical  and  political  state  of 
the  Jews  were  thoroughly  restored :  and  therefore,  where  the  Scripture 
names  those  kings  of  Persia  by  whose  favour  this  restoration  was  made,  he  is 
named  among  them  in  the  order  as  he  reigned  ;  for  it  is  said  (Ezra  vi.  14,) 
that  this  was  done  by  the  commandment  of  Cyrus,  Darius,  and  Artaxerxes, 
i.  e.  Cyrus,  the  founder  of  the  Persian  empire,  Darius  Hystaspes,  and  Artax- 
erxes Longimanus.  For  of  these,  and  none  other,  is  that  text  undoubtedly 
to  be  understood  ;  and,  no  doubt,  when  the  church  and  state  were  restored, 
mach  was  done  for  the  restoration  of  the  temple  also 


THE 


OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS 

CONNECTED,  &c. 


BOOK  V. 

Artaxeuxes  having,  by  the  death  of  Artabanus,  re- 
moved one  grand  obstacle  to  his  quiet  possessing  of 
the  throne,  had  still  two  others  to  struggle  with,  ^^^^f 
his  brother  Hystaspes  in  Bactria,  and  Artabanus's 
party  at  home.  And  this  last  being  nearest  at  hand,  gave  him 
the  first  trouble  :  for  although  Artabanus  was  dead,  he  had 
left  behind  him  seven  sons,  and  many  partisans,  who  immedi- 
ately gathered  together  to  revenge  his  death ;  whereon  a 
fierce  conflict  ensued  between  them  and  those  who  stood  by 
Artaxerxes,  in  which  many  noble  Persians  were  slain  ;  but  at 
length  Artaxerxes  having  prevailed,  did  cut  off  all  that  were 
concerned  in  this  conspiracy ;  and  especially  he  took  a  sig- 
nal revenge  of  every  one  of  those  who  had  a  hand  in  the 
murder  of  his  father,  and  particularly  of  the  eunuch  Mithri- 
dates  that  betrayed  him,  whom  he  caused  to  be  boated  to 
death.*  The  manner  of  this  punishment  was  thus :  the  per- 
son condemned  to  it  being  laid  on  his  back  in  a  boat,  and 
having  his  hands  stretched  out,  and  tied  fiist  to  each  side  of 
it,  had  another  boat  put  over  him,  his  head  only  being  left 
out  through  a  place  made  fit  for  it.  In  this  posture  they  fed 
him,  till  the  worms  which  were  bred  in  the  excrements  that 
he  voided  as  he  thus  lay,  did  eat  out  his  bowels,  and  so  caused 
his  death  ;  which  was  usually  this  way  twenty  days  in  ef- 
fecting, the  criminal  lying  all  this  while  in  exquisite  tor- 
ments.^ 

Artaxerxes,  having  mastered  this  difficulty,  was  at  leisure 
to  send  an  army  into  Bactria  against  his  brother.*^  But  there 
he  did  not  meet  with  so  easy  success  ;   for  a  fierce  battle  en- 

a  Ctesias.  b  Plutarchus  in  Artaxerxe. 

c  That  Hystaspes  was  governor  of  Bactria;  at  his  father's  death,  is  attested 
hy  Dio(Jorus  Siculus,  lib.  11,  p,  5.3 


356  CONNEXION  ©F  THE  HISTORY  OF  [I'ART  I. 

suing,  though  Hystaspes  did  not  get  the  victory,  yet  he  did  so 
well  make  good  his  ground,that  no  advantage  was  got  against 
him  ;  but  both  armies  parted  with  equal  success,  and  each 
retired  to  make  better  preparations  for  a  second  encoun- 
ter.*" 

But  the  next  year,  Arlaxerxes  having  drawn  together  a 
much  stronger  army,  as  having  the  greatest  part  of 
Amxl^'z  the  empire  at  his  devotion,  overpowered  Hystaspes, 
and  utterly  overthrew  him  in  a  second  battle  f  where- 
by having  removed  all  difBculties  and  oppositions,  he  now  be- 
came fully  possessed  of  the  whole  empire  ;^  and  the  better  to 
secure  himself  in  it,  he  removed  all  those  governors  of  cities 
and  provinces  of  whom  he  had  any  suspicion,  that  they  had 
been  concerned  with,  or  any  way  well  affected  to  either  of 
the  parties  which  he  had  suppressed,  and  put  into  their  places 
only  such  as  he  had  a  thorough  confidence  in.  After  this  he 
did  set  himself  to  reform  all  the  abuses  and  disorders  of  the 
government ;  whereby  he  gained  to  himself  much  credit  and 
authority  throughout  all  the  provinces  of  the  empire,  and 
thoroughly  established  himself  in  the  affections  of  the  people, 
wherein  lieth  the  surest  interest  of  princes. 

After  Artaxerxes  had  obtained  these  successes,  and  there- 
by firmly  settled  himself  in  the  peaceable  possession  of 
Aru»x?"^&  the  whole  Persian  empire,  he  appointed  a  solemn  re- 
joicing on  this  account,  and  caused  it  to  be  celebrated 
in  the  city  of  Shushan  or  Susa  in  feastings  and  shows,  for  the 
term  of  one  hundred  and  eighty  days,  on  the  conclusion  of 
which  he  made  a  great  feast  for  all  the  princes  and  people 
that  were  then  in  Shushan  for  seven  days.  And  Vashti  the 
fjueen  at  the  same  time  made  a  like  feast  in  her  apartment 
for  the  women.  On  the  seventh  day,  the  king's  heart  being 
merry  with  wine,  he  commanded  his  seven  chamberlains  to 
bring  queen  Yashti  before  him  with  the  crown  royal  on  lier 
head,  that  he  might  show  to  the  princes  and  people  her 
beauty  ;  for  she  was  exceedingly  fair.°  But  for  her  thus  to 
show  herself  in  such  an  assembly,  being  contrary  to  the  usage 
of  the  Persians,  and  appearing  to  her  (as  indeed  it  was)  very 
indecent,  and  much  unbecoming  the  modesty  of  a  lady,  as 
well  as  the  dignity  of  her  station,  she  refused  to  comply 
herewith,  and  would  not  come  ;  whereon  the  king,  being  very 
much  incensed,  called  his  seven  counsellors  to  take  advice 
with  them  about  it,  who  fearing  this  might  be  of  ill  example 
through  the  whole  empire,  in  encouraging  women  to  contemn 
and  disobey  their  husbands,  advised  that  the  king  should  put 
Vasthti  away  for  ever  from  him,  and  give  her  royal  state  to 

d  Ctesias.  e  Ibid. 

f  Diodorus  Siculus,Ub.  11.  g  Esther  i.    Joseph.  Anliq.  lib.  11,  c.  6. 


BOOK  V.J  THE  GLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  357 

another  that  should  be  better  than  she,  and  by  his  royal  edict 
give  command  throughout  the  whole  empire,  that  all  wives 
should  pay  honour  and  obedience  to  their  husbands,  and  that 
every  man  should  bear  rule  in  his  own  house.  Which  advice 
pleasing  the  king,  he  commanded  it  accordingly  to  be  put  in 
execution,  and  Vashti  never  more  after  that  came  again  into 
the  king's  presence  :  for  the  decree  whereby  she  was  re- 
moved from  him  was  registered  among  the  laws  of  the  Modes 
and  Persians,  and  therefore  it  could  never  again  be  altered. 
After  this,  orders  were  given  out  through  the  whole  empire, 
for  the  gathering  together  to  the  palace  at  Shushan  all  the  fair 
virgins  in  every  province,  that  out  of  them  one  might  be 
chosen  whom  the  king  should  best  like,  to  be  made  queen 
in  her  place. *" 

At  the  time  when  this  collection  of  virgins  was  made, 
there  lived  in  Shushan  a  certain  Jew, named  Mordecai, 
who  was  of  the  descendants  of  those  who  had  car-  ^taxfj; 
ried  captive  to  Babylon  with  Jeconiah  king  of  Judah, 
and,  by  his  attendants  at  the  king's  gate,  seems  to  have  been 
one  of  the  porters  of  the  royal  palace.  He  having  no  chil- 
dren did  breed  up  Hadassah,  his  uncle's  daughter,  and 
adopted  her  for  his  own.*  This  young  woman  being  very 
beautiful  and  fair,  was  made  choice  of  among  other  virgins 
on  this  occasion,  and  was  carried  to  the  king's  palace,  and 
there  committed  to  the  care  of  Hegai  the  king's  chamber- 
lain, who  was  appointed  to  have  the  custody  of  these  virgins ; 
whom  she  pleased  so  well  by  her  good  carriage,  that  he 
showed  her  favour  before  all  the  other  virgins  under  his 
care ;  and  therefore  he  assigned  her  the  best  apartment  of 
the  house,  and  provided  her  of  the  first  with  those  things 
that  were  requisite  for  her  purification.  For  the  custom  was 
that  every  virgin  thus  taken  into  the  palace  for  the  king's 
use,  was  to  go  through  a  course  of  purification  by  sweet  oils 
and  perfumes  for  a  whole  year;  and  therefore  Hadassah 
having  been  by  the  favour  of  the  chamberlain,  of  the  earliest 
provided  with  these  things,  was  one  of  the  first  that  was  pre- 
pared and  made  ready  for  the  king's  bed,  and  therefore  was 
one  of  the  soonest  that  was  called  to  it. 

The  term  therefore  of  her  purification  being  accomplished, 
her  turn  came  to  go  in  unto  the  king,  who  was  so  well 
pleased  with  her,  that  he  often  again  called  her  by  name;  ^'^^.^5; 
which  he  used  not  to  do,  but  to  those  only  of  his  wo- 
men whom  he  was  much  delighted  with.  From  this  time  she 
seems  to  have  had  the  name  of  Esther ;  for  it  is  of  a  Persian 
original ;  the  signification  of  it  is  not  now  known. 

h  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  6. 

i  Esther  ii.    Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  6, 


358  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  J. 

The  Egyptians  being  very  impatient  of  a  foreign  yoke,  in 
order  to  deliver  themselves  from  it,  rebelled  against  Artax- 
erxes,  and,  making  Inarus,  prince  of  the  Lybians,  their  king, 
called  in  the  Athenians  to  their  assistance,  who,  having  then 
a  fleet  of  two  hundred  sail  at  Cyprus,  gladly  laid  hold  of  the 
invitation,  and  forthwith  sailed  for  Egypt,  looking  on  this  as 
a  favourable  opportunity  for  the  crushing  of  the  Persian 
power,  by  driving  tliem  out  of  that  country.'^ 

Artaxerxes,  on  the  hearing  of  this  revolt,  made  ready  an 
army  of  three  hundred  thousand  men  for  the  suppressing  of 
it,  proposing  himself  to  march  into  Egypt  at  the  head  of 
them;'  but  being  dissuaded  from  hazarding  his  person  in  this 
expedition,  he  committed  it  to  the  care  of  Achaemenides, 
one  of  his  brothers.  Herodotus'"  and  Diodorus  Siculus"  say, 
that  it  was  Achaimines,  the  brother  of  Xerxes,  and  uncle  of 
Artaxerxes,  the  same  who  afore  had  the  government  of 
Egypt  in  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of  Xerxes,  that  had  the 
conduct  of  this  war:  but  herein  they  were  deceived  by  the 
similitude  of  the  names:  for  it  appears  by  Ctesias,  that  he 
was  the  son  of  Hamestris,  whom  Artaxerxes  sent  with  his 
army  into  Eg}  pt. 

Achaemenides,  being  arrived  in  Egypt  with  his  numerous 
army,  encamped  on  the  river  Nile.  In  the  interim, 
Artaxfe.  the  Athenians  having  beaten  the  Persian  fleet  at  sea, 
and  destroyed  or  taken  fifty  of  their  ships,  sailed  up 
the  Nile,  and,  having  landed  their  forces,  under  the  command 
of  Charitimis,  their  general,  joined  Inarus  and  the  F^gyplians; 
whereon,  falling  on  Achaemenides  with  their  joint  forces,  they 
overthrew  him  in  a  great  battle,  killing  one  hundred  thousand 
of  his  men,  and  among  them  Achcemenides  himself.  The 
remainder  fled  to  Memphis,  where  the  victors  pursuing  them, 
took  two  parts  of  the  town:  but  the  Persians  securing  them- 
selves in  the  third,  called  the  white  wall,  which  was  by  much 
the  largest  and  the  strongest  part,  there  suffered  asif}.e  of  near 
three  years;  during  all  which  time  they  valiaiaiy  defended 
themselves  against  their  assailants,  till  at  length  they  were 
succoured  by  those  who  were  sent  to  their  relief." 

Artaxerxes  having  received  an  account  of  the  defeat  of  his 
army  in  Egypt,  and  what  part  the  Athenians  bore  in  the 
Artat!?.  effecting  of  it,  in  order  to  divert  their  forces  from 
being  thus  employed  against  him,^  he  sent  an  ambas- 
sador to  the   LacedcBmonians,   with  great  sums  of  money, 
to  induce  them  to  make  war  upon  the  Athenians;  but  they, 

k  Thucydides,  lib.  1.     Ctesias.       1  Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  11.    Ctesias, 
m  Herodot.  lib.  3,  et  lib.  7.  n  Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  11. 

o  Thucydides,  lib.  1.     Ctesias.    Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  11. 
p  Thucydides,  lib.  1.    Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  11. 


BOOK  v.]      THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.         359 

not  being  by  any  means  to  be  wrought  to  it,  Artaxerxes  re- 
solved to  endeavour  this  diversion  another  way,  b\  sending 
himself  an  army  into  Attica,  with  Themistoclcs  at  the  head 
of  it;  which  he  thons^ht  could  not  fail  of  making  them  recall 
their  forces  out  of  E;^vpt,  beca'ise  Hion  they  would  need 
them  at  home  for  their  own  dffiMice.  Aiid  accordingly 
orders  were  sent  to  Themi^itocics  to  pri'part^  for  the  expedi- 
tion; and  an  arm\  and  a  fleet  were  drawn  towards  the  Ionian 
coast  to  be  comnitted  to  his  cond  set  for  this  purpose.  But 
Themisiocles  not  knowing  how  to  dfcline  the  command,  by 
reason  of  the  great  benefits  he  had  received  from  the  king, 
and  the  promises  he  had  made  of  serving  him  on  such  occa- 
sion, and,  on  the  other  hand,  abhorring  the  bringing  of  a  war 
upon  his  country,  to  extricate  himself  from  this  difficulty,  re- 
solved to  put  an  end  to  his  life;  and  therefore,  inviting  all  his 
friends  together,  and  having  sacrificed  a  bull,  he  drank  a  large 
draught  of  his  blood,  and  so  died.''  But  there  are  others  that 
say,  this  vvas  done  not  so  much  out  of  a  love  to  his  country, 
as  out  of  a  fear  of  encountering  the  valour  and  good  fortune 
of  Cimon,  who,  being  then  general  of  the  Athenians,  carried 
victory  with  him  wherever  he  •vent.''  But,  had  this  been  all 
the  matter,  so  wise  and  valiant  a  mAn  would  have  seen 
enough  in  this  case  not  to  have  ruti  upon  so  fatal  a  resolution. 
It  is  possible  he  might  have  beaten  Cimon  ;  if  n(  t,  it  would 
have  been  time  enough  for  him  to  have  saved  his  credit  this 
way,  by  dying  in  battle  when  vanquished;  and  therefore 
he  needed  not  to  have  anticipated  it  by  a  poisonous  draught. 
In  the  interim,  Arlabazus  governor  of  Cilicia,  and  Megaby- 
zus  governor  of  Syria,  were  ordered  to  get  ready  an  army  for 
the  relief  of  those  who  were  besieged  in  the  white  wall,  and 
for  the  carrying  on  of  the  Egyptian  war.^  This  Megabyzus^ 
was  the  son  of  Zopyrus,  and  had  been  one  of  the  generals  that 
commanded  in  the  army  which  Xerxes  led  into  Greece, whose 
daughter  Amytis  he  had  married  ;  but  she  having  very  much 
abused  his  bed  by  her  frequent  adulteries,  which  she  was 
very  infamously  addicted  to,  he  grew  very  much  disgusted  at 
it ;  and  that  not  only  with  her,  but  also  with  the  whole  royal 
family,  where  perchance  she  found  too  much  countenance  in 
her  crime,  especially  from  her  mother,  who  was  as  infa- 
mously guilty  of  it  as  herself.  This  induced  Artabanus  to 
communicate  to  him  the  plot,  which  he  had  contrived  against 
the  life  of  Artaxerxes  after  the  murder  of  his  father,  hoping 
while  he  was  under  this  discontent  to  draw  him  into  his  party. 

q  Fiutarclius  in  Themistocle. 

r  Thucydidesjlib.  1.    Plutarchus  in  Tiiemistocle  et  Cimone. 

s  Thucydides,  lib.  1.    Diodorus,  lib.  11.    Ctesias. 

t  Herodotus,  lib.  3,  in  fiae,  and  lib.  7.    Ctesia?> 


360  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

But  Megabyzus,  abhorring  the  treason,  made  discovery  of 
the  whole  to  Artaxerxes,  and  gave  him  that  counsel,  which 
put  him  in  the  way  to  get  rid  of  this  danger.  And,  after  the 
death  of  Artabanus,  he  headed  the  king's  forces  against  the 
partisans  of  the  traitor;  and  it  was  chiefly  by  his  valour  and 
conduct,  that  they  were  suppressed,  and  Artax«!rxes  secured 
on  the  throne  ;  and,  in  the  accomplishing  of  this,  he  received 
a  dangerous  wound,  of  which  he  very  diflicultly  recovered. 
By  all  which  merit  he  very  deservedly  obtained  the  tirst  place 
in  the  king's  favour,  and  therefore  was  chiefly  confided  on  in 
this  important  commission  for  the  reduction  of  Egypt. 

In  the  beginning  of  this  year  Ezra  obtained  of  king  Ar- 
taxerxes, and  his  seven  chief  counsellors,  a  very  ample  com- 
mission for  his  return  to  Jerusalem,  with  all  of  iiis  nation 
that  were  willing  to  accompany  him  thither,  giving  him  full 
authority  there  to  restore  and  settle  the  state,  and  reform  the 
church  of  the  Jews,  and  to  regulate  and  govern  both  accord- 
ing to  their  own  laws."  This  extraordinary  favour  not  being 
likely  to  have  been  obtained  but  by  some  more  than  ordina- 
ry means,  it  seems  to  have  been  granted  at  the  solicitation 
of  Esther,  who  was  now  become  the  best  beloved  of  all  the 
king's  concubines,  though  not  ye'  advanced  to  the  dignity  of 
queen.  For  it  was  usual  for  the  kings  of  I'ersia,  on  some 
particular  days  and  occasions,  to  allow  their  women  to  ask 
what  boons  they  pleased,^  and  upon  some  such  time  or  oc- 
casion it  is  most  likely  Esther,  by  the  direction  of  Mordecai, 
though  she  had  not  yet  discovered  her  kindred  and  nation, 
asked  this  of  the  king.  This  Ezra  was  of  the  descendants 
of  Seraiah  the  high-priest,  who  was  slain  by  Nebuchadnez- 
zar, when  he  burned  the  temple  and  city  of  Jerusalem. 
That  he  was  the  immediate  son  of  Seraiah  is  wholly  impro- 
bable;  for  supposing  him  to  have  been  but  one  year  old  at 
the  death  of  this  Seraiah,  he  must  now  have  been  one  hun- 
dred and  thirty-two,  and  yet  we  find  him  alive  in  the  time  of 
Nehemiah,  fifteen  years  after,^  when,  according  to  this  ac- 
count, he  must  have  been  one  hundred  and  forty-seven 
years  old,  though  he  was  then  of  that  vigour  as  to  bear  the 
fatigue  of  reading  the  law  for  a  whole  forenoon  together  to 
all  the  people  of  the  Jews  ;  which  is  a  thing  wholly  unlikely 
in  those  days  ;  and  therefore  where  he  is  said  to  be  the  son 
of  Seraiah,  it  must  be  understood  in  that  large  sense  wherein 
commonly,  in  Scripture,  any  descendant  is  said  to  be  the  son 
of  any  ancestor  from  whom  he  was  derived  ;  and  we  need 
seek  no  farther  for  an  instance  of  this,  than  the  very  text 
where  Ezra  is  said  to  be  the  son  of  Seraiah;  for  in  the  same 

u  Ezra  vii.  x  Herodotus,  lib.  9. 

V  Nehemiah  viii. 


i.  C3ee  •£•  unron.  VI.  7 — 9.  a  EzravU.  12.  b  Ezra  viii 

c  A  dai-ic  was  apiece  of  gold  of  the  value  of  one  of  our  jacobuses.     Sew 
above,  book  2.  d  Ezra  vii  25,  26. 

V0L,f.  46 


IjQOK  v.]  THE  OLB  AND  NEW  TESTAMENl'Si  3t»J 

place  Azariah  is  said  to  be  the  son  o^  Meraiotb,  though  there 
were  six  between.^  As  Ezra  was  a  very  holy,  so  also  was 
he  a  very  learned  man,  and  especially  he  was  very  excellently 
skilled  in  the  knowledge  of  the  holy  Scriptures  ;  and  therefore 
he  is  said  to  have  been  a  very  ready  scribe  in  the  law  of  God  : 
which  he  was  so  eminent  for,  that  Artaxerxes  takes  particular 
notice  of  it  in  his  commission/  He  began  his  journey  from 
Babylon  on  the  first  day  of  the  tirst  month,  called  Nisan 
(which  might  fall  about  the  middle  of  our  March,)  and  hav- 
ing halted  at  the  river  Ahava  till  the  rest  of  his  company 
was  come  up  to  him,  he  there,  in  a  solemn  fast,  recommend- 
ed himself  and  all  that  were  with  him  to  the  Divine  protec- 
tion, and  then,  on  the  twelfth  day,  set  forward  for  Jerusalem^ 
where  they  all  safely  arrived  on  the  first  day  of  the  tifth 
month,  having  spent  four  whole  months  in  their  journey  from 
Babylon  thither.*'  On  his  arrival,  he  delivered  up  to  the 
temple  the  offerings  which  had  been  made  to  it  by  the  king 
and  his  nobles,  and  the  rest  of  the  people  of  Israel  that  staid 
behind,  which  amounted  to  one  hundred  talents  of  gold,  with 
twenty  basins  of  gold  of  the  value  of  one  thousand  darics,*^ 
and  six  hundred  and  fifty  talents  of  silver,  with  vessels  of 
silver  of  the  weight  of  one  hundred  talents  more*  And 
then,  having  communicated  his  commission  to  the  king's 
lieutenants  and  governors  throughout  all  Syria  and  Palestine,, 
he  betook  himself  to  the  executing  of  the  contents  of  it ; 
whereby  he  was  fully  empowered  to  settle  both  the  church 
and  the  state  of  the  Jews  according  to  the  law  of  Moses^ 
and  to  appoint  magistrates  and  judges  to  punish  all  such  as 
should  be  refractory,  and  not  become  obedient  to  it,  and 
that  not  only  by  imprisonment  and  confiscation  of  goods,  but 
also  with  banishment  and  death,  according  as  their  crimes 
should  be  found  to  deserve.'^  And  all  this  power  Ezra  was 
invested  with,  and  continued  faithfully  to  execute  it  for  the 
apace  of  thirteen  years,  till  Nehemiah  arrived  with  a  new 
commission  from  the  Persian  court  for  the  same  work* 

Esther  growing  farther  still  in  the  king's  favour,  and  gain- 
ing his  affection  beyond  all  the  rest  of  his  women,  he  advan- 
ced her  to  higher  honour,  and  on  the  tenth  day  of  the  tenth 
month,  which  falls  about  the  end  of  our  year,  did  put  the 
royal  diadem  upon  her  head,  and  declared  her  queen  in  the 
stead  of  Vashti ;  and  thereon  made  a  solemn  feast  for  his 
princes  and  servants,  which  was  called  Esther's  feast,  and, 
in  honour  of  her,  at  the  same  time,  made  a  release  of  taxes 
to  the  provinces,  and  gave  donatives  and  presents  to  all  that 

z  See  2  Chron.  vi.  7—9.  a  Ezra  vii.  12.  b  Ezra  viii= 

c  A  dai-ic  was  a  piece  of  gold  of  the  value  of  one  of  our  jacobuses.  Se^ 
above,  book  2,  d  Ezra  vii  25,  26. 


362  'OONNKXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  01'  [PART  I'. 

then  attended  him,  according  to  the  grandeur  and  dignity  of 
his  royal  estate  5  which  gave  Ezra  the  greater  encourage- 
ment under  her  protection  and  patronage  to  go  on  with  the 
work  of  reforming  and  settling  the  Jewish  church  and 
state  in  Judea  and  Jerusalem,  which  he  had  there  under- 
taken;® 

And  from  his  entering  on  this  work,  the  beginning  of  the 
seventy  weeks  of  the  famous  prophecy  which  is  delivered  to 
us  in  the  ninth  chapter  of  Daniel,  concerning  the  coming 
of  the  Messiah,  is  to  be  computed.  The  words  of  the  pro- 
phecy, in  our  English  translation,  are  as  followeth  : 

Ver.  24,  "  Seventy  weeks  are  determined  upon  thy  peo- 
})le,  and  upon  thy  holy  city,  to  finish  the  transgression,  and 
to  make  an  end  of  sins,  and  to  make  reconciliation  for  ini- 
quity, and  to  bring  in  everlasting  righteousness,  and  to  seal 
up  the  vision  and  prophecy,  and  to  anoint  the  most  holy :'' 
ver.  25,  "  Know,  therefore,  and  understand,  that,  from  the 
going  forth  of  the  commandment  to  restore  and  to  build  Je- 
rusalem, unto  the  Messiah  the  Prince,  shall  be  seven  weeks, 
and  threescore  and  two  weeks :  the  street  shall  be  built 
again,  and  the  wall,  even,  in  troublous  times  ;"  ver.  26, 
"  And  after  threescore  and  two  weeks  shall  Messiah  be  cut 
off,  but  not  for  himself;  and  the  people  of  the  prince  that 
shall  come,  shall  destroy  the  city,  and  the  sanctuary ;  and 
the  end  thereof  shall  be  with  a  flood,  and  to  the  end  of  the 
war  desolations  are  determined;"  ver.  27,  "And  he  shall 
confirm  the  covenant  with  many  for  one  week  ;  and  in  the 
midst  of  the  week  he  shall  cause  the  sacrifice  and  the  obla- 
tion to  cease,  and  for  the  overspreading  of  abominations  he 
shall  make  it  desolate,  even  until  the  consummation,  and 
that  determined,  shall  be  poured  out  upon  the  desolate." 

And  it  being  of  great  moment,  for  the  conviction  of  Jews 
and  other  infidels  who  reject  the  faith  of  Christ,  to  have  this 
prophecy  well  cleared,  and  made  out,  in  order  hereto  it  is  to 
be  observed, 

I.  That  this  prophecy  doth  relate  primarily  and  especially 
to  the  Jews.  For  it  expresseththe  time  that  was  determin- 
ed upon  the  people  of  Daniel,  that  is,  the  Jews,  and  upon 
the  holy  city,  that  is,  Jerusalem,  the  whole  of  which  was  se- 
venty weeks  ;  that  is,  that  this  was  the  time  which  God  had 
foreordained  and  determined  upon  the  Jews  for  their  being 
his  peculiar  people,  and  upon  Jerusalem  for  its  being  his 
holy  city  ;  after  the  expiration  of  which,  an  end  being  to 
be  put  to  the  Mosaic  economy,  they  should  be  no  longer 
God's  peculiar  people,  and  the  worship  which  he  had  estab- 

e  Esther  ji. 


SOOK  V.J  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  363 

]ished  at  Jerusalem  being  to  be  abolished,  that  city  should 
be  no  longer  a  city  holy  unto  him. 

.II.  That  these  seventy  weeks  are  weeks  of  years  :  for 
among  the  Jews,  as  there  were  sabbatical  days,  whereby 
their  days  were  divided  into  weeks  of  days  ;  so  (here  were 
sabbaticaFyears,  whereby  their  years  were  divided  into  weeks 
of  years;  and  this  last  sort  of  weeks  is  that  which  is  here 
mentioned:  so  that  every  one  of  the  weeks  of  this  prophe- 
cy contains  seven  years,  and  the  whole  number  of  seventy 
weeks  contain  four  hundred  and  ninetyyears,attheend  where- 
of this  determined  time  expired  ;  after  which  the  Jews  were 
no  more  to  be  the  peculiar  people  of  God,  nor  Jerusalem  his 
holy  city,  because  then  the  economy  which  he  had  established 
among  them  was  to  cease,  and  the  worship  which  he  had  ap- 
pointed at  Jerusalem,  was  wholly  to  be  abolished.     And, 

III.  All  this  was  accomplished  at  the  death  of  Christ: 
for  then  the  Jewish  church,  and  the  Jewish  worship  at  Jeru- 
salem, were  wholly  abolished,  and  the  Christian  church 
and  the  Christian  worship  succeeded  in  their  stead  ;  then 
the  time,  which  was  determined  upon  the  Jews  for  their 
being  God's  peculiar  people,  and  upon  Jerusalem  for  its  be- 
ing his  holy  city,  being  fully  expired,  thenceforth  began  the 
kingdom  of  the  Messiah  ;  and  instead  of  the  Jews,  all  the 
nations  of  the  world  were  called  thereunto,  and,  instead 
of  Jerusalem,  every  place  through  the  whole  earth,  where 
God  should  be  worshipped  in  spirit  and  in  truth,  was  made 
holy  unto  him.  And  therefore  then  (he  seventy  weeks 
of  this  prophecy  must  have  their  ending:  for  they  were 
determined  and  decreed  for  this  purpose  ;  and  therefore 
in  this  they  must  have  their  conclusion.  And  this  all  the 
events,  which  are  in  this  prophecy  predicted  to  be  brought 
to  pass  at  the  conclusiori  of  (hese  weeks,  do  necessarily 
prove.  In  the  twenty-fourtii  verse,  we  have  six  of  them,  for 
the  accomplishing  of  which  these  seventy  weeks  are  tliere 
said  to  be  determined  ;  and  therefore  at  the  accomplishing 
of  them  these  weeks  must  have  their  ending.  They  are 
these  following.  1st.  To  finish  (or  restrain")  transgressions  ; 
2d.   To  make  an  endofsins ; ''   3d.  To  make  (expiation  or)  re- 

f  Lev.  XXV.  8. 

g  Tlie  word  Lecalle  in  tlie  Hebrew  signifieth  to  restrain,  as  well  as  to  sliul 
up  or  finish,  and  the  former  rather  than  the  latter. 

h  Here  is  a  various  reading  in  the  Hebrew  text  as  to  the  word  whlcii  we 
translate  to  make  an  end  of.  For  whereas  tlie  true  reading  is  Lehatf.m,  that 
is,  lo  finish  or  make  an  end  of,  and,  in  the  next  line  after,  there  is  the  word 
Lachtom.  wiiich  there  signitietli  to  seal  up  ;  and  these  two  words  as  to  the 
letters  differing  only  in  this,  that  the  former  is  ^\  ritten  witii  an  He  in  the 
middle,  and  the  other  with  a  C/ietli,  the  similitude  that  is  between  tijese  two 
letters  in  the  Hebrew  alphabet  (for  they  differ  very  little  the  one  from  the 
nllier/i  led  transcribers  into  this  mistake,  that  they  wrote  the  \\  ord  as  if  it. 


364  CONNEXION  OK  THE  HISTORY  OR  [I'AUT  i. 

concili(xiion  fo7-  iniquity;^  4th.    To  bring  in  everltisting  righte- 
ousness ;  5th.  To   seal  up    (or  complete  and   fulfiP)    vision 
and  prophecy  ^  and  6th.    To   anoint  the  most  holy.      And  all 
these  were  accomphshed  in    that  great  work  of  our  salva- 
tion, which    Christ   our    Lord    undertook  for  us,  and  fully 
completed   by  his  death    and  passion,  and  his  resurrection 
from  the  dead;  for  being  born  without  original  sin,  and  hav- 
ing lived  without  actual  sin, 'he  was  truly  (he  most  holy  of  all 
that  bore  our  nature.     And  being  thereby  fully  fitted  for  this 
great    work,    ke   was    anointed    with  the    Holy   Ghost,  and 
with  power,  to  be  our  King,    and  our  Priest,    and  our   Pro- 
phet, for  the  atFecting  and  accomplishing  of  it.  And  having, 
as  our  Priest,  otle.red  up  himself  a  sacrilice  upon  the  cross, 
to  make  expiation    and   atonement  for  all  our  sins,  he  did 
thereby  7nake  an  end  oj  them,  by  taking  away  their  guilt ;  and, 
in  so  doing,  he  did  roork  reconciliation  for  us  with  our  God. 
And    having,   as   our    Prophet,    given    unto    us    his  gospel, 
the  law    of  everlasting  righteous}iess,  which  was  not  a  tem- 
porary law,  as  was  that  of  Closes,  but  to  last  for  ever,  and 
to    be    our   guide    unto    all    righteousness,   as    long  as    the 
world  should  last ;  and  also,   liaving,  as  our   King,  sent  his 
holy  Spirit  into  our  hearts,  to  influence    and  govern  us  ac- 
cording to  this  law,  he  hath  done  all  for  us  that  is  necessary, 
thereby  to  restrain  and  extinguish  in  us  all  manner  of  trans- 
gressions, and  fully  deliver  us  from  the  power  of  them.  And, 
in  doing  all    this,    he  hath  sealed  up,    that    is,  fidjilled,  and 
thoroughly  finished  all  that,  which,  by  visions  and  prophecies ^ 
had  been  before  revealed  concerning  him.     And  therefore  all 
these  events   being  thus  brought  to  pass  and  accomplished 
at  the  time  of  Christ's  death,  this  necessarily  determines  us 
there  to  fix  the  end  of  these  weeks  which  were   appointed 
ibr  the  accomplishing  of  them. 

IV.  The  end  of  these  weeks  being  thus  fixed  at  the  death 
of  Christ,  it  doth  necessarily  determine  us  where  to  place 
the  beginning  of  them,  that  is,  four  hundred  and  ninety  years 
before.  And  therefore  the  death  of  Christ,  as  most  learned 
men  agree,  falling  in  (he  year  o,f  the  .lulian  period  4746,' 
and  in  the  Jewish  month  Nisan,™  if  we  reckon  four  hundred 

were  Lachtom  in  both  places.  But  it  is  corrected  in  the  margin.  How- 
ever this  would  not  iiavc  altered  the  sense,  because  the  same  Mord,  which 
signifieth  In  sent  vp  in  Hebrew,  is  also  used  lo  signifj'  to  Jinisfi  or  make  com- 
plete, because  the  putting  ofthe  seal  to  any  instrument  or  writing,  comjiletes 
the  matter  about  which  it  is,  and  finisheth  the  whole  transaction. 

i  The  word  in  the  Heljrew  te*t  properly  signifieth  to  expiate  as  hi)  sacri- 
fice ;  and  by  such  an  expration  did  Christ  our  Lord  work  reconciliation  for 
us  with  our  God.  k  Sec  note  h. 

I  Scaliger  de  Emendatione  Temporum,  lib.  6,  p.  562.  U.sherus  in  Anna- 
libus  sub  anno  J.  P.  474<>.     Sf  rauchius,  alliique. 

m  Christ  suffered  at  the  time  of  the  passovej':  which  was  always  celebra-- 
^i  in  (be  middle  of  the  month  Nisan> 


15O0K  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  365 

and  ninety  years  backward,  this  will  lead  us  up  to  the  month 
Nisan  in  the  year  of  the  Julian  period  4256,  which  was 
the  very  year  and  month  in  which  Ezra  had  the  commission 
from  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  king  of  Persia,,  for  his  return 
to  Jerusalem,  there  to  restore  the  church  and  state  of  the 
Jews  ;"  for  that  year  of  the  Julian  period,  accordinj^  to 
Ptolemy's  canon,  was  the  seventh  year  of  that  king's  reign, 
in  which  the  Scriptures  tell  us  his  commission  was  grant- 
ed." The  beginning,  therefore,  of  the  seventy  weeks,  or  four 
hundred  and  ninety  years  of  this  prophecy,  was  in  the  month 
JVisan  of  the  Jewish  year,  in  the  seventh  year  of  Artaxerxes 
Longimanus,  king  of  Persia,  and  in  the  4256lh  year  of  the 
Julian  period,  when  Ezra  had  his  commission  ;  and  the  end 
of  them  fell  in  the  very  same  month  of  Nisan,  in  the  4746th 
year  of  the  Julian  period,  in  which  very  year  and  very 
month  Christ  our  Lord  suffered  for  us,  a-nd  thereby  comple- 
ted the  whole  work  of  our  salvation,  there  being  just  seven- 
ty weeks  of  years,  or  four  hundred  and  ninety  years,  from 
the  one  to  the  other. 

V.  It  is  evident,  from  the  prophecy  itself,  that  these  weeks 
must  have  this  beginning,  that  is,  from  the  date  of  the  com.- 
mission  granted  Ezra.  For,  1st.  They  are  pinned  down 
thereto  by  an  express  character  in  the  text ;  and,  2dly.  They 
cannot,  agreeable  (o  that  and  other  Scriptures,  and  the  au- 
thentic histories  of  the  times  to  which  they  relate,  have  it 
any  where  else. 

And  1st.  These  weeks  must  have  their  beginning  from 
the  date  of  the  commission  granted  Ezra,  because  they  are 
pinned  down  thereto  by  an  express  character  in  the  text ;  and 
that  character  is  the  going  forth  of  the  commandincnt  to  restore 
and  build  Jerusalem  :  for  that  from  thence  the  seventy  weeks 
must  have  their  beginning,  the  text  is  very  express  ;•'  and, 
to  excite  us  the  more  to  observe  it,  introduceth  it  with 
this  remarkable  preface,  Knozo,  therefore,  and  understand. 
But  this  commandment  or  decree  was  that  which  was  grant- 
ed to  Ezra  in  that  commission  with  which  he  was  sent  into 
Judea,  in  the  seventh  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  king 
of  Persia  ;  and  therefore  from  thence  the  beginning  of 
these  weeks  must  commence.  For  the  words  in  the  text,  to 
restore  and  build  Jerusalem,  are  not  to  be  understood  lite- 
rally, but  tiguratively,  for  the  restoiing  of  the  state  of  the 
Jews,  as  well  the^olitical  as  the  ecclesiastical,  and  the  reset- 
tling of  both,  according  to  the  law  of  Moses.  And  what  is 
more  usual  in  prophecies,  than  to  be  given  out  in  figurative 
expressions  ?  and  what  is  more  common  in  Scripture,  than  by 

n  Ezra  vii.  9.     There  it  is  said  in  the  first  month,  and  the  first  month  of 
the  Jewisli  year  was  Nisan.  o  Ezra  vii.  7.  p  Daniel  ix.  25. 


36G  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

Jerusalem  to  mean  the  whole  political  and  ecclesiastical 
state  of  the  people  ?  and  for  the  re-establishing  of  both 
these,  and  the  settling  of  them  again  upon  the  former  basis. 
from  whence  they  had  been  overthrown  by  the  Babylonians,' 
and  were  not  as  yet  but  very  imperfectly  restored,  the 
commission  granted  to  Ezra  was  very  full  :  for  it  gave 
him  thorough  power  to  restore  the  law  of  Moses,  and  fully 
re-establish  the  observance  of  it  both  in  church  and  state, 
and  to  appoint  magistrates  and  judges  to  govern  the  people 
according  to  it,  and  to  punish  all  such  as  should  be  disobe- 
dient thereto,  either  with  death,  banishment,  imprisonment, 
or  confiscation  of  goods,  according  as  their  crimes  should  be 
found  to  deserve. 1  And  all  this  Ezra  accordingly  executed, 
in  manner  as  will  hereafter  be  related.  Before  his  coming 
to  Jerusalem  with  this  commission,  the  Scriptures  were  in  a 
manner  lost,  the  people  in  a  profound  ignorance  of  the  law, 
and  the  worship  of  God  neglected,  and  every  thing  else, 
both  in  church  and  state,  in  great  disorder  and  confusion. 
But  on  his  coming,  he  restored  the  Scriptures,  instructed  the 
people  in  the  law,  brought  the  worship  of  God  into  due  or- 
der, and  proceeded,  as  long  as  his  commission  lasted,  to 
work  a  full  reformation  in  all  things  else.  And  after  his 
commission  was  at  an  end,  he  gave  not  over  his  endeavours 
herein,  but  as  a  priest,  as  a  skilful  scribe  in  the  law  of  God, 
and  as  president  of  the  Sanhedrim,''  he  still  carried  on  the 
same  work  :  and,  having  a  successor  equally  zealous  in  the 
same  design,  he  did  as  much  in  it  under  his  authority  as  for- 
merly he  did  by  his  own  :  so  that  he  hath  been  esteemed  as 
another  Moses,  and  deservedly  reckoned  as  the  second  foun- 
der of  the  Jewish  church  and  stale.  And  therefore  the 
beginning  of  this  work  is  a  noble  epocha  from  whence  to 
begin  the  calculation  of  these  weeks,  and  doth  most  agreea- 
bly accord  with  the  intent  and  purpose  of  this  prophecy,  in 
which  they  are  predicted  :  for  the  whole  intent  and  purpose 
of  it  is.  to  foreshow  and  set  forth  the  age  of  the  restored 
church  of  the  Jews,  how  long  it  was  to  continue,  and  when 
to  cease,  and  be  abolished  ;  and  from  whence  it  is  more 
proper  to  reckon  this,  than  from  the  time  when  the  thorough 
restoration  of  it  began  ?  And  this  was  then  only  begun, 
when  Ezra,  by  virtue  of  the  commission  granted  to  him  by 
Artaxcrxes  Longimanus,  king  of  Persia,  in  the  seventh  year 
of  his  reign,  did  set  about  this  work  ;  and  therefore  from 
hence,  the  computation  of  these  weeks,  according  to  the 
prophecy  that  predicts  them,  must  begin.  And,  that  this 
ligurative  interpretation  of  the  words,  and  none  other,  must 

q  See  tiie  commission  in  Ezra  vii.  11 — 26.  r  IS'ehemiah  viii. 


BOOK  V.J       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS,  3G7' 

be  the  true  meaning  of  them,  appears  from  hence,  that  they 
cannot  be  understood  in  a  hteral  sense  :  for,  if  they  are  so 
to  be  understood,  they  can  be  applicable  to  no  other  restor- 
ing and  rebuilding  of  Jerusalen),  than  that  which  was  de- 
creed and  commanded  by  Cyrus  at  the  release  of  the  capti- 
vity ;  for  this  prophecy  was  revealed  to  Daniel  before  this 
release,  and  therefore,  when  it  is  said  therein,  that  the 
epocha  of  these  weeks  was  to  begin  from  the  going  forth  of 
the  command  or  decree  to  restore  and  build  Jerusalem,  of 
what  decree  can  it  be  more  properly  understood,  than  of 
that,  which  should  first  be  granted  next  after  this  prophecy 
for  that  purpose,  and  by  virtue  whereof  this  city  was  accord- 
ingly rebuilt,  after  its  having  been  destroyed  by  the  Baby- 
lonians, and  was  again  repeopled  and  inhabited  by  the  same 
people  who  had  been  its  former  inhal)itants  ?  And  that  this 
was  done  by  virtue  of  Cyrus's  decree,  appears  from  many 
places  of  Scripture.  We  are  told  in  Isaiah,  (xliv.  28,)  that 
"  it  was  Cyrus  that  should  say  to  Jerusalem,  Be  thou  built, 
and  to  the  temple,  Thy  foundation  shall  be  laid."  And 
again,  (xlv.  13,)  it  is  said  of  the  same  Cyrus,  that  "  God 
would  raise  him  up,  and  direct  him,  that  he  should  build  this 
city,  and  release  his  captives  ;"  where  it  is  to  be  observed, 
that  he  that  released  God's  captives,  and  laid  the  foundation 
of  the  temple,  was  to  be  the  person  that  was  to  rebuild 
Jerusalem  ;  so  that  he  is  not  only  by  name,  but  also  by  this 
character  and  description,  plainly  pointed  out  to  be  the 
person  that  was  to  do  this  work.  For  that  Cyrus  did  release 
the  captive  Jews,  who  were  God's  people,  and  that  he  did 
no  more  than  lay  the  foundation  of  the  temple  (for  it  was 
not  perfected  till  in  an  aftcr-reign,)  is  well  known.  And  there- 
fore, according  to  these  passages  of  holy  Scripture,  it  must 
be  he  only  that  did  restore  and  rebuild  Jerusalem.  And  so 
accordingly  it  was  done  by  virtue  of  the  decree  which  he 
granted  for  the  return  of  the  Jews  thither:  for,  can  it  be 
imagined,  that  Cyrus  should  grant  license  for  the  Jews  to 
return  to  Jerusalem,  and  rebuild  the  temple  there,  without 
allowing  them  to  rebuild  that  city  also  ?  Ezra  plainly  tells 
us,  that  as  soon  as  the  Jews  were  returned  into  Judea,  by 
virtue  of  Cyrus's  decree,  they  dispersed  themselves  into  the 
several  cities  to  which  they  belonged,  and  again  dwelt  in 
them  ;^  and  can  it  be  thought  that  they  did  not  then  again 
rebuild  them  ?  F'or  without  rebuilding  of  them,  how  could 
they  dwell  in  them  ?  And  if  those  who  belonged  to  the 
other  cities  of  Judah  rebuilt  and  dwelt  in  them  again,  how 
can  we  think,  that  those  who  belonged  to  Jerusalem,  did  not 

s  Ezra  ii.  1 ;  iii.  2 


368  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OF  [I'ART   n 

do  the  same,  and  that,  especially  since  it  was  the  metropolis 
o(  the  wliole  nation,  the  place  where  the  temple  stood, 
wliere  all  went  up  continually  to  worship,  and  wliere  three 
times  a  }'ear  every  male  appeared  before  the  Lord  at  the 
solemn  festivals,  and  where  also  the  governor  dwelt,  where 
the  council  sat,  and  all  matters  of  judgment  were  ultimately 
decided  ?  The  matter  is  beyond  all  dispute  ;  when  the  Jews 
on  their  return,  rebuilt  their  other  cities,  they  must  then 
most  certainly  have  rebuilt  Jerusalem  also.  The  great  con- 
course, which  the  reasons  1  have  mentioned  constantly  dre>y 
thither,  must  have  necessitated  this,  had  there  been  no  other 
inducement  for  it.  It  is  easier  to  suppose  all  the  rest  of  the 
cities  of  Judah  to  have  been  left  still  in  their  rubbish,  after 
the  return  of  the  Jews  from  their  captivity,  than  that  this 
city  alone  should  remain  unbuilt.  The  rebuilding  of  it  is 
not  indeed  expressly  included  in  the  commission  of  Cyrus. 
As  we  have  it  recorded  in  the  first  chapter  of  Ezra,  that  only 
j^Mves  license  '•  to  the  J<.;ws  to  return  into  Judea,  and  there 
rebuild  the  house  of  God  which  is  in  Jerusalem."  But  the 
license  to  rebuild  the  house  of  God  which  is  in  Jerusalem, 
must  either  imply  a  license  to  rebuild  Jerusalem  also,  or 
else,  (which  seems  most  probable,)  Ezra  gives  us  in  the  place 
mentioned,  only  an  abstract  of  the  chief  things  granted  by 
that  license,  and  not  a  recital  of  the  whole,  in  which,  most 
likely  many  other  things,  and  among  them,  the  rebuilding  of 
Jerusalem,  and  the  other  cities  of  Judah,  might  be  fully  and 
expressly  mentioned  ;  for  it  is  certain,  by  virtue  of  that  li- 
cense, they  had  power  so  to  do  ;  and  accordingly  executed  it. 
For  the  complaint  of  the  neighbouring  nations  to  the  Persian 
court  against  them  that  were  returned  was,  that  ''  they  build- 
ed  Jerusalem,  that  rebellious  and  bad  city,  and  had  set  up 
the  «  alls  thereof,  and  joined  the  foundations  of  it  ;'"•  and  the 
order  from  Artaxerxes  (so  the  Magian  who  then  reigned,  it 
seems,  called  himself)  was  "  To  cause  the  Jews  to  cease, 
that  this  city  be  not  builded.""  However,  from  the  first  of 
Cyrus,  till  the  time  of  this  order,  fourteen  years  having 
elapsed,  the  rebuilding  of  Jerusalem  had  by  that  time  gone 
a  great  way  ;  for,  within  two  years  after,  we  tind  the  pro- 
phet Haggai  complaining  of  the  Jews  at  Jerusalem,  "  That 
they  dwelt  in  ceiled  houses,  while  thej  let  the  house  of  God 
lie  waste. "^  From  all  this  it  plainly  appears,  (hat  Jerusa- 
lem, after  its  having  been  destroyed  by  the  Babylonians, 
was  again  rebuilt,  by  virtue  of  the  decree  which  Cyrus 
granted,  in  the  first  year  of  his  reign,  for  the  release  and 
restoration  of  the  Jews.     And  therefore,  if  these  words  of 

t  Ezra  iv.  12.  u  Ezra  iv.  21 

X  Haggai  i.  4 


iiOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  ANL»  NEW  TESTAME.Vl'S.  36$ 

the   prophecy,     To  restore  and  build  Jerusalem,  are   to  be 
understood  in   a  literal  sense,  they   can  be  understood  of 
no    other    restoring   and    building  of   that  city,   than    that 
which  was   acconriplished   by   virtue   of   that   decree ;    and 
the  computation  of  the  seventy  weeks  must  begin  from  the 
granting  and  going  forth  thereof.     But  if  the  computation 
be  begun  so  high,  the  four  hundred  and  ninety  years  of  the 
said  seventy  weeks  cannot  come  low  enough  to  reach  any  of 
those  events  which  are  predicted  by  this  prophecy  :  for,  from 
the  first  of  Cyrus  to  the  death  of  Christ  were  live  hundred 
and  sixty-eight  years  ;   and  therefore,  if  the  said  four  hun^ 
dred  and  ninety  years  be  computed  from  thence,  they  will 
be  expired  a  great  many  years  either  before  the  cutting  ofT 
or  the  coming  of  the  Messiah,  which  ought  both  to  fall  withia 
the  compass  of  them,  according  to  the  express  words  of  this 
prophecy.     It  evidently,  therefore,  follows  from  hence,  that 
the  words  of  this  prophecy.   To  restore  and  build  Jerusalem^, 
cannot  be  understood  in  a  literal  sense  :   for  the  sum  of  the 
whole  argument  is  thus  :    If  the  words  are  to  be  understood 
in  a  literal  sense,  they  must  be  understood  of  that  rebuilding 
of  Jerusalem  which  was  accomplished  by  virtue  of  Cyrus's 
decree,  and  the  computation  of  the  seventy  weeks,  or  the 
four  hundred  and  ninety  years  thereof,  must  begin  from  the 
going  forth  or  issuing  out  of  that  decree.     But  it  cannot 
begin  from  thence,  for  the  reason  mentioned  ;  and  therefore 
these  words  cannot  be  understood  in  a  literal  sense,  but  must 
be  interpreted  to  mean  figuratively  the  restoring  and  re- 
building the  church  and  state  of  the  Jews  at  Jerusalem. 
And  this  Ezra  etfected,  by  virtue  of  the  command  or  decree 
which  was  granted  to  him,  for  this  purpose,  in  the  seventh 
year  of  Artaxcrxes  Longimanus:    and   therefore  here  the 
beginning  of  these  weeks  must  be  placed.     And  this  will  be 
farther  proved,  if  we  consider, 

2dly.  That  it  can  be  placed  nowhere  else,  so  as  to  make 
the  ending  comport  with  the  intent  and  purpose  of  the  pro- 
phecy, and  the  accomplishing  of  the  events  predicted  by  it» 
For  there  were  four  commandments  or  decrees  issued  out 
by  the  kings  of  Persia  in  favour  of  the  Jews,  from  one  of 
which,  according  to  the  express  words  of  the  prophecy,  the 
computation  of  these  weeks  is  to  be  begun  ;  the  first  granted 
by  Cyrus,  in  the  first  year  of  his  reign,^  the  second  by  Darius, 
about  the  fourth  year  of  his  reign,^  the  third  by  Artaxerxes 
to  Ezra,  in  the  seventh  year  of  his  reign,^  and  the  fourth  by 
the  same  Artaxerxes  to  Nehemiah,  in  the  twentieth  year  of 
his  reign. ^  But  this  computation  could  not  begin  from  that 
of  Cyrus,  nor  from  that  of  Darius,  nor  from  that  of  the 
y  Ezra  i.  z  Ezra  vi  a  Ezra  vii.  b  Nehemiab  u 

Vox.  h  47 


370  conK'exion  op  the  history  of  [part  :. 

twentieth  of  Artaxerxes,  and  therefore  it  must  begin  from 
this  of  the  seventh  of  Artaxerxes  granted  to  Ezra.  That  it 
could  not  begin  from  any  of  the  other  three  I  shall  show  in 
their  order. 

And,  1st.  As  to  the  decree  of  Cyrus,  the  four  hundred 
and  ninety  years  of  these  weeks  cannot  be  computed  from 
thence,  for  the  reason  already  said,  that  is,  because  if  they 
begin  from  thence,  they  cannot,  by  a  great  many  years, 
reach  the  events  predicted  by  this  prophecy,  and  therefore, 
none  who  understand  this  prophecy  to  relate  either  to  the 
cutting  olf,  or  the  coming  of  the  Messiah,  do  begin  them 
from  hence  ;  for,  according  to  this  computation,  no  chrono- 
logy can  ever  reconcile  them  to  either  of  them. 

2dly.  Neither  can  the  computation  of  these  weeks  be 
begun  from  the  decree  granted  by  Darius :  but  there  having 
been  three  Dariuses  that  reigned  in  Persia,  Darius  Hystas- 
pes,  Darius  Nothus,  and  Darius  Codomannus,  it  is  to  be  first 
inquired,  which  of  these  three  it  was  that  granted  this  de- 
cree, and  then,  secondly,  it  shall  be  shown,  that  the  com- 
putation of  these  weeks  cannot  be  begun  from  it.  And, 
first,  of  these  three  Dariuses  it  is  certain  it  could  not  be 
Darius  Codomannus :  for  if  the  four  hundred  and  ninety 
years  of  these  weeks  be  reckoned  from  any  part  of  his  reign, 
they  will  overshoot  all  the  events  predicted  by  this  prophecy 
by  many  more  years  than  they  will  fall  short  of  them,  if 
reckoned  from  the  first  of  Cyrus  ;  and  therefore  no  one  hath 
ever  said,  that  he  was  the  Darius  that  granted  this  decree. 
But  Scaliger,  and  many  others  following  his  authority,  have 
said  it  of  Darius  Nothus.  But  there  are  invincible  argu- 
ments against  it,  which  unanswerably  demonstrate,  that  it 
could  not  be  Darius  Nothus  ;  but  it  must  necessarily  be 
Darius  Hystaspes,  the  first  of  these  three  that  reigned  in 
Persia,  and  none  other,  by  whom  this  decree  was  issued  out: 
for  he,  who,  according  to  Ezra,  granted  this  decree,  is  the 
same  Darius,  of  whom  mention  is  made  in  Haggai  and  Zecha- 
riah  f  but  that  Darius  could  not  be  Darius  Nothus,  but  must 
necessarily  be  Darius  Hystaspes.  For  first,  from  the  des- 
truction of  the  temple  of  Jerusalem  by  the  Chaldeans  to 
the  reign  of  Darius  Nothus,  were  one  hundred  and  sixty- 
five  years  :  but  from  the  destruction  of  it  to  the  time  of  the 
second  decree,  by  virtue  of  which,  the  rebuilding  of  it  was 
finished,  were  no  more  than  seventy  years,  according  to  the 
prophet  Zechariah.  For  we  find  in  the  book  of  his  prophc- 
cies,''  that  in  the  fourth  year  of  the  same  Darius  who  granted 
this  decree  to  the  Jews  (which  was  also  the  year  in  which  it 

c  Ezrav.  1 ;  vi.  14.     Hag.  i.  1—15.     Zecli.  i.  1—7  ;  vii.  1 
<{  Zecli.  vii.  5 


SOOK  V.'}^  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  371 

was  published  at  Jerusalem,)  the  fast  of  the  fifth  month,^  in 
which  they  had  mourned  for  the  destruction  of  the  temple, 
and  the  fast  of  the  seventh  month,  in  which  they  had  mourned 
for  the  utter  desolation  of  the  land,  which  had  been  brought 
upon  it  by  the  death  of  Gedaliah,  had  been  observed  just  se- 
venty years  ;^  and  no  one  can  doubt,  w ho  thoroughly  considers 
that  text,  but  that  their  mourning  for  these  calamities  had 
.  been  from  the  very  time  that  they  had  suffered  them  ;  and 
that  therefore  it  could  not  be  Darius  Nothus,  but  it  must  be 
some  other  Darius  then  reigning  in  Persia,  within  the  reach 
of  the  said  seventy  years,  who  granted  this  decree  ;  and  that 
since  the  fourth  year  of  Darius  Hystaspes  was  just  seventy 
years  from  the  time  in  which  the  city  and  temple  of  Jerusa- 
lem were  destroyed  by  the  Chaldeans  (as  hath  been  before 
observed,)  this  other  Darius  must  necessarily  be  Darius 
Hystaspes.  It  must  be  acknowledged,  that  the  same  pro- 
phet speaks  also  in  another  place  of  the  like  number  of 
seventy  years  in  the  second  of  Darius  two  years  before. 
But  these  were  not  the  seventy  years  of  mourning  for  the 
destruction  of  the  city  and  temple  of  Jerusalem,  but  the 
seventy  years  in  zvkich  God  had  expressed  his  indignation  against 
Jerusalem  and  the  cities  of  Judah  ;^  which  are  to  be  computed 
from  the  time  that  Nebuchadnezzar  came  up  against  Judah, 
and  besieged  Jerusalem,  for  which  the  Jews  fasted  in  the 
tenth  month  ;  and  this  was  two  years  before  that  city  was 
taken  and  destroyed  by  him.  For  the  taking  and  destroying 
of  Jerusalem  was  in  the  eleventh  year  of  Zedekiah ;  but  the 
first  besieging  of  it,  was  in  the  ninth  year  of  Zedekiah,  and 
in  the  tenth  month  of  that  year.**  But  Scaliger,'  instead  of 
being  convinced  by  this  argument,  turns  it  to  speak  for  him  ; 
and  his  reasonings  upon  it  for  this  purpose  are,  that  these 
fasts,  which  are  spoken  of  in  Zechariah*^  to  have  been  ob- 
served on  the  fourth  and  fifth  month,  and  on  the  seventh 
month,  and  the  tenth  month,  could  not  be  appointed,  but 
by  the  church  of  the  Jews,  by  which  1  suppose  he  meaneth 
the  Sanhedrim,  or  some  other  convention  of  priests  and  elders 
representing  that  church.     But  neither  the  Sanhedrim,  nor 

e  2  Kings  xxv.  8.  Jer.  lii.  12.  Tbe  Jews  observe  this  fast  on  the  ninth  oi 
Ab,  which  is  their  fifth  month,  even  to  this  day. 

f  2  Kings  xxv.  25.  Jer.  xli.  1.  The  Jews  observe  this  fast  on  the  third 
day  of  Tisri,  which  is  their  seventh  month,  even  to  this  day  ;  and  both  these 
fast  days,  that  of  the  third  of  Tisri,  and  the  other  of  the  yth  of  Ab,  are  mark- 
ed on  those  days  in  all  their  calendars. 

g  Zech.  i.  12. 

h  2  Kings  xxv.  1.  Jer.  xxxix.  1;  lii.  4.  The  Jews  observe  this  fast  on 
the  tenth  day  of  Tebetb  (which  is  their  tenth  month)  even  to  this  day,  and 
<;all  it  the  fast  for  the  first  siege  of  Jerusalem  in  all  their  calendars 

i  De  EmendationeTemporum,  lib.  6,  p.  602, 

k  Zech.vii.  5  •.  viii.  19. 


372  COxVNEXlON  OF   THE  HISTCRV  OF  [PART   I. 

hny  other  convention  representing  that  church,  could  come 
together,  or  make  any  such  constitution  after  the  calamities 
which  these  fasts  commemorated,  till  the  Jews  were  returned 
from  their  captivity,  and  again  settled  in  Judah  and  Jerusa- 
lem 5  and  therefore  these  fasts  could  not  begin  to  be  observed, 
nor  the  seventy  years  observing  of  them,  which  Zechariah 
speaks  of,  commence  till  after  that  time.  But  seventy  years 
from  any  time  after  the  return  of  the  Jews  from  the  Baby-, 
lonish  captivity  will  carry  us  much  beyond  the  reign  of  Da- 
rius Hystaspes  ;  and  therefore  it  could  not  be  the  fourth  year 
of  Darius  Hystaspes,  but  it  must  be  the  fourth  year  of  the 
Darius,  the  next  of  that  name  who  reigned  after  him  in  Per- 
sia, (and  that  was  Darius  Nothus,)  in  which  these  fasts  were 
spoken  of  by  that  prophet.  But  the  answer  to  all  this  is, 
that  there  was  no  need  of  any  such  formal  constitution  of 
the  whole  Jewish  church  for  the  observing  of  these  fasts. 
The  calamities  ^which  they  commemorated,  while  fresh 
in  memory,  might  be  reason  enough  to  introduce  the  use 
of  them  by  common  consent ;  and  if  not,  yet  what  should 
hinder,  but  that  the  priests  and  elders  might  meet  to- 
gether in  Babylon,  while  there  in  captivity,  and  in  that 
place,  as  well  as  if  they  had  been  at  Jerusalem,  hold  con- 
ventions for  the  making  of  such  a  constitution  ?  If  the 
bopk  of  Baruch  be  to  be  credited  in  any  thing,  that  tells  us 
of  such  a  convention  in  Babylon,  held  there  in  the  time  of 
the  captivity,  and  of  a  fast  appointed  by  it.'  And  we  find 
in  the  book  of  Ezekiel,  which  is  of  undoubted,  because  of 
divine  authority,  that  the  elders  of  Israel  in  Babylon  met 
more  than  once  to  ask  counsel  of  God  from  the  mouth  of  the 
prophet."  And  when  Sherezer  and  Regem-Melech  came  to 
Jerusalem  to  ask  counsel  of  the  prophets  and  priests  there, 
in  the  name  and  behalf  of  the  Jews  of  Babylon,  about  these 
fasts,"  can  we  think  that  they  were  sent  by  any  other,  than  a 
convention  of  the  priests  and  eldtrs  in  that  place  met  toge- 
ther for  this  purpose  ?  It  is  certain,  that  most  of  the  consti* 
tutions  that  are  now  observed  by  the  Jews,"  were  made  in 
the  land  of  Babylon,  by  conventions  of  their  elders,  after  the 
last  destruction  of  Jerusalem  (for  all  that  are  in  the  Ba- 
bylonish Gemara  were  there  made.)     And  why  then  might 

1  Baruch  i.  AKhougli  perchance  this  book  be  no  more  than  a  relifjious 
romance,  yet  such  romances  do  usually  so  accommodate  their  fables  to  the 
lasages  and  customs  of  the  people,  and  times  of  which  they  treat,  hs  not  to 
.ascribe  any  other  to  them  than  such  as  have  been  of  known  use  and  practice 
in  them  ;  and  therefore  these  books  may  be  of  some  authority  for  usages 
and  customs,  although  not  for  history, 

m  Ezek.  vii   1  ;  xiv.  1.  n  Zech.  vii.  1 — 3. 

o  The  Jews  had  in  the  land  of  Babylon  three  universities,  Sora,  Naherda, 
and  Pombeditha,  where  they  had  their  public  schools,  and  public  conven- 
tions of  their  principal  doctors  and  learned  men  ;  and  in  these  the  con-iitu- 
Hionsthat  are  in  the  Babylonish  Gemara  were  all  mode 


feOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  37o 

Bot  a  constitution  for  these  fasts  be  made  there  also  by  a  like 
convention  after  the  first  destruction  of  that  city  ?  and  why 
there  might  not  be  a  Sanhedrim  in  Babylon,  during  the  cap- 
tivity of  the  Jews,  I  cannot  see.  The  temple  service  was  in- 
deed contined  to  Jerusalem  ;  but  the  Sanhedrim  was  no  part 
of  it.  That  was  a  iiauonal  council,  which  might  be  assembled 
wherever  the  nation  was.  And  therefore,  when  the  whole 
nation  of  the  Jews  was  removed  into  the  land  of  Babylon, 
who  can  give  a  reason  why  this  national  council  should  not  be 
there  also,  and  there  meet  and  consult  together  for  the  com- 
mon interest  of  the  nation  in  that  land,  as  well  as  they  did 
when  they  were  in  their  own.  We  arc  told  by  the  Jewish 
■writers,  that,  from  the  lime  of  Alexander  the  Great,  there 
was  a  Saiihedrim  in  Alexandria  in  Eg}pt,P  for  the  sake  only 
of  a  colony  of  the  Jews  that  was  there  planted,  even  while 
Judea  and  Jerusalem  were  fully  inhabited.  And  how  much 
more  then  might  th.ere  have  been  one  at  Babylon,  when  the 
whole  nation  was  removed  thither  during  their  captivity  in 
that  land  ?  It  is  plain  from  hence,  that,  in  every  part  of  this 
argument,  Scaliger  begs  his  principles,  and  therefore  they 
can  be  of  no  force  for  the  proof  of  any  thing  that  he  would 
infer  from  them.  But,  2dly.  That  the  Darius  who  granted 
this  second  decree  could  not  be  Darius  Nothus,  hut  must  ne- 
cessarily he  Darius  Hystaspes,  will  further  appear  from  the 
part  which  Jeshua  the  high-priest  and  Zcrubbabel  the  go^ 
vernor  acted  in  it ;  for  they  were  the  persons  who  were  sent 
to  Jerusalem  with  the  tirst  decree  that  was  granted  by  Cyrus,** 
and  they  also  executed  the  second  decree  that  was  granted 
by  Darius. *■  But  if  this  Darius  was  Darius  Nothus,  supposing 
Jeshua  to  have  been  fort)  years  old  at  the  granting  of  Cyrus's 
decree,  (and  less  at  the  time  he  could  not  be,  he  having  then 
sons  in  the  work  of  the  temple  of  twenty  years  old  and  up- 
wards,^) and  supposing  Zerubbabel  to  be  thirty  years  old,  (and 
a  less  age  could  not  comport  with  his  office)  the  former  must 
have  been  one  hundred  and  tifty-seven,  and  the  other  one 
hundred  and  forty-seven  years  old,  when  this  second  decree 
granted  by  Darius  was  executed  by  them;  which  is  utterly  im- 
probable. Scaliger,  to  make  out  the  probability  of  it,  brings 
instances  of  several  long-livers.*^  1  deny  not,  it  is  possible  one 
in  a  century  may  be  found,  who  may  have  reached  the  first 
of  these  ages,  that  is,  that  of  one  hundred  and  fifty-seven.  For 
we  have  had  a  Parr  who  hath  come  nigh  it,  and  a  Jenkins 

p  Geinarah  Hierosol.  in  Succah,l'ol.  55.  Gemara  Babylonica  in  Succah, 
fol.51. 

q  Ezra  ii.  2  ;  iii.  8,  fcc. 

r  Ezra  v.  6.     Haggai  i.2.     Zech.  iii,  iv.  s  Ezra  iii.  8,  9. 

t  De  Emendatione  Temporum,  lib.  6.  p.  603,  and  in  Animadversionibus 
adCbronologicaEusebii,  sub  anno  1497,  p.  97. 


374  CONNEXION   OK  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART   I, 

who  hath  outlived  it."  But  that  two  together,  and  colleagues 
in  the  same  work  and  business,  should  live  so  long,  is  not 
likely.  But,  3dly.  The  improbability  of  this  will  appear 
much  farther,  if  we  consider  the  words  spoken  by  God  him- 
self in  the  second  year  of  this  Darius,  which  we  have  in 
Haggai  ii.  3.  Who  is  left  among  you  that  saw  this  house  iii  its 
first  glory  ?  And  hoxo  do  you  see  it  now  ?  Is  it  not  in  your  eyes 
in  comparison  of  it  as  nothing  F  For  this  text  doth  plainly 
express,  that  some  were  then  alive  who  had  seen  the  first 
temple,  and  well  remembered  the  beauty  and  glory  of  it ; 
and  therefore,  if  this  Darius  were  Darius  Notlius,  they  must 
have  been  of  an  age  much  more  beyond  belief,  than  either 
that  of  Jeshua,  or  that  of  Zerubbabel  above  mentioned.  Foi-, 
from  the  eleventh  year  of  Zedekiah,  in  which  the  temple  was 
destroyed,  to  the  second  of  Darius  Nothus,  had  passed  one 
hundred  and  sixty-six  years;  and  therefore,  supposing  these 
persons,  who  are  here  said  to  have  seen  the  first  temple,  and 
remembered  the  glory  of  it,  had  been  then  seven  years  old, 
(which  is  the  lowest  that  can  be  allowed  for  such  a  remem- 
bering.) they  must  have  been  of  the  age  of  one  hundred  and 
seventy-three  in  the  second  year  of  Darius  Nothus.  And 
who  can  think  it  likely,  that  many  '^as  the  text  seems  to  ex- 
press,) or  any  at  all  among  the  people,  should  then  be  found 
of  so  great  an  age  ?  Scaliger  himself  thinks  this  improbable  ; 
and  therefore  to  evade  the  strength  of  the  argument,  which 
is  from  hence  brought  against  him,  he  would  turn  the  words 
of  the  sacred  text  to  speak  thus.  Oh!  if  any  among  you  had 
seen  the  glory  of  the  frst  house,  cj-c.^  But  the  text  will  not 
bear  this  interpretation.  4thly.  The  series  of  the  kings  of 
Persia,  as  mentioned  in  Ezra,  plainly  makes  the  Darius,  who 
granted  this  second  decree  in  favour  of  the  Jews,  to  be  the 
fourth  that  reigned  in  that  empire ;  and  the  fourth  king  therein 
all  agree  was  Darius  Hystaspes ;  for  after  Cyrus,  uho  was 
the  first,  succeeded  Cambyscs  the  second,  and  alter  him  was 
the  Magian  the  third,  and  then  was  Darius  Hystaspes  the 
fourth.  And  in  the  same  order  are  these  things  mentioned  in 
Ezra  in  respect  to  the  temple  and  the  rebuilding  of  it :  for  he 
tells  us,  that,  during  tlie  reign  of  Cyrus,  though  he  had 
granted  a  decree  for  the  rebuilding  of  the  temple  at  Jerusa- 
lem, yet  the  work  was  discouraged  all  his  reign,  through  the 
fraud  of  his  otiicers,  corrupted  by  the  bribes  of  the  Samari- 
tans ;y  that,  in  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of  Ahasuerus,  who 
next  succeeded  (i.  e.  Cambyses.)  the  king  himself,  being 
wrote  to,  discouraged  the  work,  but  made  no  decree  against 
it,  out  of  respect,   it  is  supposed,  to    his  father's   decree, 

u  Parr  lived  to  the  age  of  one  hundred  and  fifty-two,  and  Jenkins  to  that 
of  one  hundred  and  sixty-nine.     See  Sir  William  Temple's  Tracts. 
X  De  Emendatione  Teroporup,  lib.  6,  p.  603.  y  Ezra  \y.  5,  6,  7. 


BOOK  v.]      THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENT».  Sib 

which  was  for  it.  But  Artaxerxes,  the  next  that  reigned, 
(i.  e.  the  Magian,)  having  no  such  regard  to  what  Cyrus 
had  ordered,  made  a  decree  against  the  work ;  whereon 
it  wholly  ceased  (which  it  had  not  done  before)  for  the 
space  of  two  years,  until  the  second  year  of  Darius.* 
This  Darius,  therefore,  must  be  Darius  Hystaspcs,  and 
none  other;  for  he  it  was  that  was  the  fourth  of  those 
kin^s  that  reigned  over  the  Persian  empire.  And  the  pro- 
phecy of  Daniel  (ch.  xi.)  helps  to  make  this  out ;  for  there 
(ver.  2,)  the  words  are,  "•  Theie  shall  stand  up  yet  three 
kings  in  Persia,  and  the  fourth  shall  be  far  richer  than  they  all, 
and  by  his  strength,  through  his  riches,  he  shall  stir  up  all 
against  the  realm  of  Grecia."  By  which  it  appears,  that  the 
four  kings  here  spoken  of  were  those  who  were  to  reign  iti 
Persia  after  him  that  was  then  reigning  ;  and  he  that  was  king 
of  Persia  at  that  time  was  Cyrus.  And  it  is,  from  the  same 
words,  most  manifest,  that  the  fourth  was  Xerxes ;  and  there- 
fore, according  to  this  place  of  Scripture,  there  were  between 
Cyrus  and  Xerxes  three  kings  in  Persia:  and  Herodotus  and 
other  historians  say  the  same,  and  thus  name  them,  1.  Cam- 
byses ;  2.  Smerdis,  the  Magian;  and,  3.  Darius  Hystaspes  : 
and  therefore,  since  the  Scripture  doth  name  in  the  same 
order,  after  Cyrus,  these  three  as  kings  of  Persia,  1.  Ahasue- 
rus ;  2.  Artaxerxes  ;  and,  3.  Darius,  no  doubt  they  were  the 
same  persons  ;  and  this  Darius,  the  third  of  them,  was  he  that 
granted  the  second  decree  for  the  rebuilding  of  the  temple 
at  Jerusalem.  But,  against  all  this,  the  short  time  that  was 
between  the  granting  of  the  first  decree  by  Cyrus,  and  the 
second  year  of  Darius  Hystaspes,  is  made  an  objection  ;  and 
they  being  men  of  great  name  who  have  thought  it  of 
weight,  it  must  not  be  passed  over  without  an  answer,  al- 
though otherwise  it  seems  not  worthy  of  any.  They  urge 
it  thus  :  from  the  time  of  the  granting  of  Cyrus's  decree,  to 
the  second  of  Darius  Hystaspes,  were  no  more  than  sixteen 
years ;  and  therefore,  if  it  were  then  that  the  resuming  of 
the  work  of  the  temple  gave  occasion  for  the  searching  of 
the  records  for  this  decree,^  and  it  were  that  Darius  who,  on 
the  finding  of  the  decree,  granted  a  confirmation  of  it,  there 
would  then  have  been  no  reason  for  any  such  search  to  have 
been  made  at  all ;  for,  say  they,  what  need  was  there  of 
searching  of  the  records  for  this  decree,  before  its  confirma- 

z  So  saith  the  writer  of  the  first  apocryphal  book  of  Esdras,  v.  73,  And 
although  he  be  an  apocryphal  writer,  and  is,  in  most  things  where  he  doth 
not  translate  from  the  canonical  book  of  Ezra,  very  fabulous,  yet,  in  this 
particular,  he  may  well  be  supposed  to  deliv^er  himself  according  to  the  re- 
ceived tradition  of  the  age  in  which  he  lived,  and  the  histories  then  ex- 
tant ;  and  this  was  very  ancient ;  for  it  is  certain  he  wrote  before  Josephus  ; 
and  an  ancienter  evidence  than  this  we  cannot  have  from  any  writer,  since 
the  Scriptures  of  the  Old  Testament,  concerning  this  matter. 

a  Ezravi 


3t(j  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY   Of  [PART  ii 

tion,  after  so  short  time  as  that  of  sixteen  years  ?  The  thing 
might  then   have  been  well  enough   remembered,   without 
going  to  the  records  for  the  proof  of  it.     Darius  Hystaspes 
was    himself  (they   proceeded   to    argue,)   bred   in   Cyrus's 
court,   and    therefore  n)ight  himself  well  enough   have   re- 
membered this   thing,  without   ordering  the    records  to   be 
searched  for  it  ;  and,  if  not,  yet  many  of  his  counsellors  and 
courtiers  might.     And,  therefore,  from  hence  they  infer,  that 
it  could  not  be  Darius  Hystaspes   that  granted   this  decree, 
but  it  must  necessarily  have  been  another  Darius  reigning 
after  him,  in  whose  time  the  granting  of  Cyrus's  decree  was 
grown  to  be  a  thing  past  the  memory  of  man  ;  and  that  could 
be  none  other  than  Darius  Nothus.     The  whole,  therefore, 
of  this  argument,  goes  upon  this  supposition,  that  public  re- 
cords are  never  to  be  appealed  to,  but  for  things  past  the  me- 
mory of  man  ;  than  which  what  can  be  more  absurd.     Can 
any  that  attend  the  chancery  here  in  England  remember  all 
the  grants  and  decrees  that  have  passed  the  seals  for  sixteen 
years  past  ?  Can  the  chancellor  himself  do  this,   if  he  hath 
been  so  long  in  office  ?  Or,  if  any  decree  be  to  be  made  upon 
the  foundation  of  a  former  decree,  though  passed  but  sixteen 
days  before,  will   any  chancellor,   upon   memory  only,  seal 
that   latter  decree,  or   pass   any  thing  in  it,  without  having 
the  former  first  laid  before  him  ?  Although  some  may  have  a 
confused    remembrance,  in   general,  of  some   things  there 
transacted  even  for  sixteen  years  past,  yet,  amidst  the  variety 
and  multiplicity  of  business  which  pass  in  such  a  court,  and 
where  the  quick  succession  of  new  matters  frequently  crowd 
out  of  the  mind  all  thoughts  of  all  those  that  preceded,  whose 
memory  can  be  sufficient  to  be  depended  upon  for  an  exact 
account  of  any  thing  there  decreed,  without  having  recourse 
to  the  records,  where  all  is  exactly  set  down  and  registered? 
and  how  can  any  thing  be  there   rightly  settled   without  it? 
And  if  this  cannot  be  done  for  so  small  a  realm  as  this  of  Eng- 
land, how  could  it  be  done  for  so  large  and  va^t  an  empire  as 
that  of  Persia,  which  was  above   forty  times  as  large,  and 
therefore  must  have  afforded  occasion  for  grants  and  decrees 
forty  times  as  many.*^     It  is  scarce  possible  to  conceive  how 
such  a  multitude  of  things,  as  must  in  this  case  have  been  de- 
creed and  granted  for  all  that  empire,  could   have  been   all 
distinctly  remembered  by  any  one  after  a   week  past ;  and 
how  much  less  after  sixteen  years  ?  As  to  the  memory  of 
Darius  himself,  Herodotus"^  tells  us,  he  was  but  twenty  years 
old  when  Cyrus  died,  and  therefore  could  not  have  been  above 
fourteen  when  this  decree  was  granted  for  the  return  of  the 

b  The  Scripture  tells  us,  that  it  reached  from  India  to  Ethiopia,  and  con- 
tained, in  the  time  of  Cyrus,  one  hundred  and  twenty  provinces  and  after- 
ward seven  more  were  added  to  them.     See  Dan.  vi.  l,and  Esther  i,  1. 

o  Herodotus,  lib.  1,  non  longe  a  fine. 


BOOK  V.J  THE  OLD  A.ND  NEW  'rESTAMENT.5.  377 

Jews  ;  and  what  could  he  know  or  observe  of  it  at  that  age  2 
And  as  to  the  courtiers  of  Darius,  the  argument  is  not  at  all 
stronger.  For  is  every  courtier  called  to  be  a  witness  of  all 
the  public  acts  and  decrees  of  the  kingdom  ?  Do  all  such 
know  whatever  passeth  the  royal  signature  ?  or  rather,  are 
they  not  the  fewest  of  all  that  observe  or  take  notice  of  such 
matters  ?  And,  if  otherwise,  yet  doth  not  sixteen  years  usually 
make  great  revolutions  in  kings'  courts,  especially  in  those  of 
arbitrary  princes,  where  not  only  men's  places,  but  also  their 
lives,  depend  wholly  upon  their  will  and  pleasure,  as  was  most 
notoriously  the  case  of  the  Persian  court  at  that  time  ?  Cam- 
hyses,  who  succeeded  Cyrus,  cruelly  and  wantonly,  upon 
freak,  humour,  and  very  trivial  occasions  only,  destroyed  a 
great  many  of  his  father's  officers.^  And  after  him  reigned 
the  Magian,  who,  no  doubt,  upon  that  usurpation,  provided 
himself  with  such  a  new  set  of  officers  and  attendants  as 
would  best  serve  to  support  him  in  it,  and  conceal  the  impos- 
ture by  which  he  reigned.  And,  on  his  death,  there  being  a 
new  revolution,  and  a  new  king  chosen,  most  likely  thispro= 
duced  another  change  of  officers  and  ministers  at  the  court, 
and  by  that  time  many  must  have  gone  oflfthe  stage  by  natural 
death  ;  so  that,  whether  any  at  all  that  had  been  officers  in 
Cyrus's  court,  when  he  granted  his  decree  in  favour  of  the 
Jews,  were  in  Darius's  court,  in  the  second  year  of  his  reign, 
then  to  remember  it,  and  give  evidence  thereof,  is  at  best 
very  uncertain  ;  but  it  is  most  likely  that  none  of  them  were. 
And,  therefore,  nothing  that  is  said  from  this  head,  for  the 
proving  that  it  could  not  be  Darius  Hystaspes  that  granted 
the  decree  above  mentioned,  can  amount  to  as  much  as  an  ar- 
gument of  the  lowest  probability  for  it.  But,  on  the  contrary, 
they  who,  for  the  sake  of  this  argument,  put  the  granting  of  this 
decree  as  low  as  the  time  of  Darius  Nothus,  do  thereby  af- 
ford a  much  stronger  argument  against  themselves  than  this 
can  be  for  them  ;  for  this  will  put  the  finishing  of  the  second 
temple  at  the  distance  of  one  hundred  and  eighteen  years 
from  the  beginning  of  it.  Whereon  it  may  be  asked,  when 
it  was  that  the  decree  of  Artaxerxes  made  it  cease!  If  they 
allow  this  Artaxerxes  to  be  the  third  Persian  king,  as  he  is 
reckoned  in  Scripture,®  that  is,  the  Magian,  who  reigned  next 
after  Cambyses,  then,  from  the  ceasing  of  the  work  to  the 
resuming  of  it  again,  will  be  full  one  hundred  years ;  and,  in 
so  long  a  time  of  intermission,  how  could  they  so  preserve 
the  beams  from  being  rotten,  and  the  whole  building  from 
being  so  damaged  and  decayed,  as  not  to  be  forced  to  begin 
all  again  anew  from  the  very  foundation  ?  which  it  is  certain 

d  Herodotus,  lib.  3-  e  Ezra  ir.  7. 

YOL.  I.  42 


378  CONNEXION  OF   THE   HISTORY    OF  [I'ART  i. 

they  (lid  not ;  for,  after  the  granting  of  the  decree  for  the 
proceeding  of  the  work,  all  was  finished  in  a  little  more  than 
three  years  time.  But  if  they  say  it  was  not  the  Magian, 
who  was  the  Artaxerxes  in  the  Scriptures  that  caused  the 
work  to  cease,  hut  he  that  is  first  named  in  the  catalogue 
which  we  have  of  the  Persian  kings  in  profane  history,  that 
K,  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  then,  from  the  beginning  of  the 
work  to  that  ceasing  of  it  will  be  seventy-one  years.  And, 
in  this  case,  it  may  be  asked,  how  came  it  to  pass,  if  they 
had  so  long  been  permitted  to  have  gone  on  with  the  work, 
that  in  all  that  time  it  had  not  been  finished  ?  Neither  of  these 
questions  can  be  answered  ;  and  therefore,  taking  either  of 
these  ways,  the  argument  worketh  strong  against  them,  and 
farther  proves,  that  it  could  not  be  Darius  Nothus,  but  that 
it  must  necessarily  be  Darius  Hystaspes  who  granted  the 
decree,  whereby  the  rebuilding  of  the  second  temple  was 
finished.  And,  upon  this  supposition,  all  will  be  easy  and  free 
of  difficulty,  and  the  whole  proceeding  will  be  thus:  Cyrus, 
in  the  first  year  of  his  reign  over  the  whole  Persian  empire, 
granted  his  decree  to  the  Jews  for  the  rebuilding  of  the 
temple  at  Jerusalem :  the  next  year  after  they  began  the 
work,  and  went  on  with  it  for  about  thirteen  years,  till  the 
Magian  caused  it  to  cease.  But  two  years  after,  in  the  second 
year  of  Darius  Hystaspes,  who  slew  the  Magian,  and  suc- 
ceeded him  in  the  throne,  it  was,  on  the  preaching  of  the 
prophets  Haggai  and  Zcchariah,  again  resumed,  and,  about  a 
year  and  a  half  after,  they  obtained  a  decree  from  Darius  to 
authorize  them  therein  ;  and  then,  in  a  little  more  than  three 
years  time  after,  they  finished  the  whole  work.  And  thus 
far  having  shown,  that  the  Darius  who  granted  the  second  de- 
cree in  favour  of  the  Jews,  by  virtue  of  which  the  rebuild- 
ing of  the  temple  at  Jerusalem  was  finished,  could  be  none 
other  than  Darius  Hystaspes,  the  remaining  part  of  the  argu- 
ment is,  that  therefore  the  seventy  weeks  of  this  prophecy 
could  not  have  their  beginning  from  this  decree,  which  is  de- 
monstrated by  the  same  reason  whereby  it  hath  been  above 
shown,  that  they  could  not  begin  from  the  decree  of  Cyrus, 
that  is,  because  the  four  hundred  and  ninety  years  of  these 
weeks,  reckoned  from  the  granting  of  this  decree,  cannot 
reach  the  chief  events  which  are  by  this  prophecy  predicted 
to  fall  within  the  compass  of  them,  that  is,  the  coming  and 
the  cutting  off  of  the  Messiah  :  for  this  decree  I  reckon 
was  brought  to  Jerusalem  in  the  fourth  year  of  Darius.  The 
Jews  indeed  began  again  with  the  rebuilding  of  the  temple  in 
the  latter  end  of  the  second  year  of  Darius  ;  but  they  had 
no  decree  to  warrant  them  herein  till  the  beginning  of  the 
fourth  year  of  his  reign.     But.  from  the  fourth  year  of  Da- 


BOOK  V.  j  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  379 

rius  Hystaspes  to  the  death  of  Christ  were  five  hundred  and 
fifty  years  ;  and  therefore,  reckoning  the  seventy  weeks,  or 
their  four  hundred  and  ninety  years,  from  thence,  they  will 
expire  sixty  years  before  the  death  of  Christ,  and  twenty- 
four  years  before  the  birth  of  Christ;  and  therefore  can 
reach  neither  the  cutting  off  of  the  Messiah,  nor  the  coming  of 
the  Messiah,  in  any  sense  whatsoever  that  his  coming  can  be 
taken  in  :  and  these  two  are  the  grand  events  predicted  by 
this  prophecy,  and  it  can  never  be  rightly  interpreted  but  in 
the  accomplishing  of  them.  And  it  may  be  farther  added  on 
this  head,  that  this  decree  of  Darius,  seems  not  to  accord  or 
agree  with  the  description  of  that  commandment  or  decree 
which  is  mentioned  in  the  prophecy  :  for  the  words  of  the  text 
are,  From  the  going  forth  of  the  commnndment  to  restore  andhuild 
Jerusalem,  which  plainly  imply  an  original  decree,  which  this 
of  Darius  was  not ;  for  it  was  no  more  than  an  exemplifica- 
tion and  confirmation  of  that  which  was  before  granted  by 
Cyrus. '^  And  if  it  be  not  such  a  decree  as  the  prophecy  in- 
tended, it  is  certain  the. seventy  weeks,  or  their  four  hundred 
and  ninety  years,  cannot  begin  from  thence. 

3dly.  Neither  can  the  computation  of  these  weeks  be  be- 
gun from  the  decree  granted  to  Nehemiah  by  Artaxerxes  in 
the  twentieth  year  of  his  reign.  And,  in  the  clearing  of  this 
particular,  I  must  take  the  same  method  as  in  the  former : 
for,  as  there  were  three  Dariuses,  so  also  were  there  three 
Artaxerxep,  which  according  to  ancient  historians,  reigned 
over  the  empire  of  the  Persians,  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  Ar- 
taxerxes Mnemon,  and  Artaxerxes  Ochus.  And  therefore, 
first,  it  must  be  inquired  which  of  these  three  it  was  that 
granted  this  decree  ;  and  then,  secondly,  it  shall  be  shown 
that  the  computation  of  these  weeks  cannot  begin  from  it. 
And,  first,  as  to  which  of  these  three;  Artaxerxes  it  was 
that  granted  this  decree  to  Nehemiah,  it  is  certain  it  must 
be  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  who  reigned  immediately  after 
Xerxes  over  the  Persian  empire.  For  it  was  that  Artaxerxes 
who  was  contemporary  with  Eliashib  the  high-priest  of  the 
Jews,  he  being  high-priest  at  the  time  when  Nehemiah  came 
to  Jerusalem  with  this  decree,^  which  was  in  the  twentieth 
year  of  that  king:  but  no  other  Artaxerxes,  but  he  that  was 
called  Longimanus,  could  be  contemporary  with  Eliashib ; 
and  therefore  none  other  but  he  could  be  the  Artaxerxes 
that  granted  this  decree.  For  the  age  which  Joiakim,  the 
father  of  Eliashib,  must  then  have  been  of  at  the  time  of  his 
death,  makes  it  utterly  improbable  that  it  should  be  Arta- 
xerxes Mnemon  ;  and  it  would  make  it  much  more  so,  as  to 

f  EctiI  vi.  g  Nehemiah  iii.  J. 


'380  I  o:cxEMON  er  thk  mjiouv  of  [rAux  i. 

Ailaxerxes  Ochus  who  succeeded  iiim  :  for  supposing  Elia- 
shib,  who  was  high-priest  in  the  twentieth  year  of  tliat  Arta- 
xerxcs  who  granted  this  decree  to  Nehemiah,  had  then  been 
twenty  years  in  that  olHce,  his  father  Joiakim,  if  this  Arta- 
xerxes  were  Artaxerxes  Mncmon,  must  then,  upon  this  sup- 
position, have  died  in  the  last  year  of  Darius  Nothus,  at 
which  time  Joiakim  must  have  been  at  least  one  hundred 
and  fifty-one  years   old,  which  is  utterly  improbable.     For 
we  find  in  Ezra,  that  Jeshua,''  the  father  of  Joiakim,  at  the 
first  return  of  the  Jews  to  Jerusalem  after  the  Babylonish 
captivity,  had  sons  of  twenty  years  old  and  upward  employed 
in   the   work  of  the  temple  ;'  and  since  the  high-priesthood 
among  the  Jews  went  by  succession  according  to  the  primo- 
<^eniture,  and   Joiakim  succeeded  Jeshua  in  it,  it  cannot  be 
doubted  but  that  Joiakim  was  one   of  those  his  sons,  who 
M'cre  thus  employed,  and  the  eldest  of  them  ;  and  if  he  were 
twenty*years  old  at  this  time,  he  must  then  have  been  one 
hundred  and  fifty-one  in  the  last  of  Darius  Nothus  :  for  from 
the  first  of  Cyrus  to  the  last  of  Darius  Nothus,  were  one  hun- 
dred and  thirty-one  years.''     The  improbability  of  this  sufll- 
cientlv  proves,  that  it  could  not  be  Artaxerxes  Mnemon  who 
granted  this  decree  to  Nehemiah.     And  the  improbability 
■would  be  much  greater,  if  we  should  suppose  it  to  be  Arta- 
xerxes  Ochus  who  succeeded   him  ;  because  then  Joiakim 
must  have  been    forty-six  years  older.     Besides,  there    is 
this  farther  argument,  that  Artaxerxes  Ochus  could  not  be 
the  person  ;  because  in  Scripture  there  is  mention  made  of 
the  thirty-second  year  of  that  Artaxerxes  who  granted  this 
decree  to   Nehemiah,^  but   Artaxerxes  Ochus  reigned  only 
twenty-one  years  in   all.'^     And  if  it  were  not  Artaxerxes 
INInemon,  nor  Artaxerxes  Ochus,  it  must  then  necessarily  fol- 
low, that  it  was  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  and  none  other,  that 
granted  the  decree  to   Nehemiah  in   the  twentieth  year  of 
bis  reign.     And  thus  far  the  first  part  of  the  argument  being 
cleared,  the  second  is,  that  the  computation  of  the  seventy 
weeks  cannot  be  begun  from  this  decree,  which  will  fully  be 
manifested  by   the  calculation  of  the  years  :  for,  reckoning 
from  the  twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  to  the 
death  of  Christ,  there  will  be   no   more  than   four  hundred 
and  seventy-seven  years :  and  therefore,  if  the  four  hundred 
and  ninety  years  of  the   seventy  weeks  be  computed  from 
tlicnce,  they  will  overshoot  the  death  of  Christ  thirteen  years  ; 
which  being  the  grand  event  to   be  brought  to  pass  at  the 
conclusion  of  these  weeks,  it  is  certain  they  can  never  there 

b  Nehemiab  xii.  10..  22.  i  Ezra  iii.  8,9. 

k  Canon  Ptol.  )  Neberaiah  xiii.  6. 

Xfi  Canon  Pfnl 


BOOK  v.]     HIE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  SGI 

have  their  beginning,  from  whence  they  cannot  be  brouglit 
to  this  ending. 

But  several  great  and  learned  men,  having  a  particular 
fancy  to  begin  the  computation  of  these  weeks  from  the 
twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longiniaiius,  notwithstanding 
this  objection,  they  have  devised  several  ways  and  methods 
for  the  removal  of  it,  and  the  reconciling  the  ending  of  these 
weeks,  as  cak  ulated  from  tliis  beginning,  with  the  tune  of 
the  events  predicted. 

The  tirst  wa}  which  hath  been  proposed  for  this  purpose, 
is  to  reckon  the  seventy  weeks,  or  the  four  hundred  and 
ninety  years  of  this  prophecy  b)  lunar  years  ;  and  this  hath 
been  of  a  very  ancient  date,  for  it  hath  Africanus  for  its  author, 
who  flourished  in  the  beginning  of  the  third  century  ;  and  he 
is  followed  by  Theodoret,  Beda,  Zonarus,  Rupertus,  and 
others  ;  and  (he  generality  of  the  Romish  doctors  strike  in 
with  this  opinion,  into  which  they  are  chiefly  led  by  the  vul- 
gar Latin  translation,  which  they  have  decreed  in  their  Tren- 
tine  council  to  be  autheitic.  For  instead  of  what  we  read 
in  the  beginning  of  the  prophecy.  Seventy  weeks  are  determined 
iipon  thy  people,  &c.  this  translation  renders  it,  Septuaginta 
hebdomades  abbreziatce  swit  super  popvlum  twim,  i.  e.  Se- 
venty weeks  are  abbreviated  upon  thy  people  ;  from  whence 
they  argue  this  abbreviation  of  the  years  must  be  either 
in  their  number  or  their  quality  ;  it  cannot  be  in  their 
number:  for,  the  text  absolutely  determines  that  to  seventy 
weeks  of  years,  that  is,  four  himdred  and  ninet}  years,  and 
therefore  it  must  be  in  their  quality  or  form,  that  is,  they 
must  be  lunar  } ears,  which  are  short  years,  and  not  solar 
years,  which  are  longer  years.  But  the  Hebrew  word 
Nechtach  in  the  text  will  not  bear  this  interpretation  ;  for 
the  true  meaning  or  signification  of  it  in  that  place  is,  Mre  de- 
cided or  determined^  as  in  our  English  version  ;  and  in  this 
sense  it  is  used  in  the  Chaldee  paraphrase,"  and  nowhere  in 
any  other.  I  confess,  the  word  doth  not  occur  any  where  else 
in  the  whole  Hebrew  Bible,  or  any  other  word  of  that  root : 
and  in  the  Septuagint  it  is  rendered,  <!-verf^y,6}j(ra.)i.  But  this  is 
not  sufficient  to  justify  either  the  meaning  winch  they  would 
put  upon  the  word,  or  the  inference  which  they  would  de- 
duce from  it ;  and  if  it  could  the  difliculty  would  not  be  re- 
moved by  it;  for  lunar  years  would  carry  us  beyond  the 
mark,  as  well  as  solar  years  fall  short  of  it.  For,  whereas 
the  four  hundred  and  seventy-seven  solar  years  which  were 
from  the  twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  to  the 
death  of  Christ,  fall  thirteen  years  short  of  the  four  hundred 

n  In  Esther  iv.  a. 


382  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OP  [PAUT  I. 

and  ninety  years,  at  the  cnd'of  which  this  prophecy  doth  put 
it  •  the  same  four  hundred  and  seventy-seven  years,  when 
converted  into  lunar  years,  making  four  hundred  and  ninety- 
one  years,  and  two  hundred  and  forty-six  days  over,  do  carry 
us  one  year  and  two  hundred  and  forty-six  days  (which  is  a 
great  part  of  another  year)  beyond  the  said  four  hundred 
and  ninety  years  :  and  therefore,  this  way  of  computation 
doth  by  no  means  adjust  the  diilerence,  but  still  leaves  it 
wide  of  an  agreement,  although  not  so  wide  as  it  was  before. 
Besides,  when  Daniel  had  this  prophecy  revealed  unto  him 
by  the  angel  Gabriel,  there  was  not  any  form  of  a  year 
purely  lunar  then  any  where  in  use.  The  Chaldean  year  at 
that  time  was  most  certainly  the  N;ibonassarean  year,"  con- 
sisting- of  three  hundred  and  sixty-tive  days,  and  the  Egyptian 
year  was  the  same,^  and  so  was  also  the  Persian. *!  The 
Jews  indeed  had  their  common  years  purely  lunar/  consisting 
of  twelve  lunar  months,  and  so  had  the  Greeks,'  only  with 
this  ditference,  that  whereas  the  Jews'  lunar  months  were 
strictly  lunar,  as  being  observed  by  the  phasis,  the  Greeks, 
mistaking  a  lunar  month  to  consist  exactly  of  thirty  da}s,  in 
compounding  of  their  year  of  twelve  of  them,  made  it  amount 
to  three  hundred  and  sixty  days,  which  exceeded  its  true  as- 
tronomical measure  almost  six  days.  But,  besides  the  com- 
mon years,  they  had  also  inter'^alated  years  intermixed  with 
the  common  years,  which  reduced  all  to  the  solar  form  ;  for 
what  was  defective  of  it  in  the  common  years  was  restored 
in  the  intercalated  years.  And  this  the  Jews  as  well  as  the 
Greeks  were  necessitated  to  by  their  festivals :  for  the  Ni- 
san  of  the  Jewish  year,*  which  begun  their  ecclesiastical  year, 
being  pinned  down  by  their  passover,  (which  was  always  ce- 
lebrated in  the  middle  of  it,)  to  the  time  of  the  beginning  of 
their  harvest  ;^  and  the  month  of  Tisri,^  which  began  their 
civil  year,  being  likewise  pinned  down  by  the  feast  of  taber- 
nacles, (which  was  always  celebrated  in  the  middle  of  that 
month,^)  to  the  time  of  the  ending  of  their  vintage,*  this  ne- 
cessitated them  to  fling  in  an  intercalary   month,  whenever 

o  Vide  Scaliserum,  Petavium,  aliosque. 

p  Vide  Marshami  Caoonem  Chroiiicum,  p.  245.  Edit.  Lips. 

q  Quintus  Curtius,  lib.  3,  c.  3. 

r  Talmud  in  Rosh  Hashanah.  Maimonides  in  Kiddosh  Haciiodesh.  Mar- 
shami Cunon  ("hron   p   290,  291.  Edit.  Lips. 

3  -caliper  de  Eraendatione  Temporurn,  lib.  l,c.  De  Anno  MarsLami  Ca- 
non Chron.  657 — 659. 

t  Maimonides  ibid.  Exod.  xii.  2.    Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  1,  c.  4. 

u  Exod.  xii.  18.     Levit.  xxiii  5.     Numb,  xxviii.  16. 

X  Levit.  xxiii.  10.     Deut.  xvi.  9. 

y  Exod.  xxiii.  16.     Talmud  in  Tract  Rosh  Hashanah.  , 

z  Levit.  xxiii.  34,  39.     Numb.  xxix.  12. 

a  Exod.  xxiii.  16.    Levit.  xxiii.  39.    Dent.  xvi.  P- 


BOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  383 

their  year  fell  short  of  these  seasons.''  And  the  Greeks  were 
likewise  necessitated  to  do  the  same  thing  for  the  sake  of 
their  festivals,  especially  for  the  sake  of  their  Olympiads. 
For  the  tixed  time  for  thtir  celebrating  of  those  games,  being 
the  first  full  moon  after  the  summer  solstice,  it  alwa}?  fell 
within  the  compass  of  one  lunar  month,  either  sooner  or 
later,  in  the  solar  year  j*^  and  there  being  just  four  years  be- 
tween Olympiad  and  Olympiad,  this  necessarily  made  these 
years  to  be  solar  years,  and  cycles  and  rules  of  intercalation 
were  invented  of  purpose  to  bring  them  to  it;  and  the  same 
is  to  be  said  of  all  other  nations  which  used  the  like  form. 
Although  they  might  measure  their  months  by  the  motion  of 
the  moon,  they  always  regulated  their  years  according  to  that 
of  the  sun.  The  Arabs  indeed,  from  the  time  of  Mahomet, 
have  used  a  year  purely  lunar,  and  the  Turks  do  the  same  in 
imitation  of  them,  and  so  do  all  others  of  their  sect ;  but  of 
the  ancients  we  find  none  that  followed  this  form.  All  among 
them  that  had  lunar  years,  had  also  intercalated  years  to 
make  amends  for  their  defects ;  and  therefore,  whatsoever 
any  of  their  years  might  be  in  their  singular  numbers,  they 
were  always  solar  in  their  collective  sums.  And  who  can 
think  then,  that  in  the  collective  sum  of  seventy  weeks,  or 
the  four  hundred  and  ninety  years  of  them,  the  angel  should 
intend  a  computation  which  was  then  nowhere  in  practice, 
the  whole  world  over.  This  prophecy  concerning  principally 
the  Jews,  and  being  written  to  them  (for  it  is  in  the  Hebrew, 
which  was  the  Jewish  language,  and  not  in  the  Chaldee,  as 
some  other  parts  of  Daniel  are,)  it  is  most  likely  that  the 
computation  of  the  time  mentioned  therein  should  be  accord- 
ing to  the  Jewish  form  and  none  other  :  and  there  is  one  ar- 
gument which  I  think  undeniably  proves  it  to  be  so.  The 
weeks  of  years  by  which  the  time  of  this  prophecy  is  compu- 
ted, are  plainly  and  manifestly  the  same  with  the  sabbaths  of 
years  mentioned,  (Lev.  xxv.  8,)  and  therefore  must  be  reck- 
oned by  the  same  sort  of  years  ;  but  it  is  certain,  that  those 
sabbaths  of  years  were  reckoned  by  solar  years,  and  there- 
fore these  weeks  of  years  must  be  so  too.  That  these  sab- 
baths of  years  were  reckoned  by  solar  years  is  manifest :  for, 
they  all  began  from  the  first  of  Tisri,  which  was  pinned  down 
by  the  feast  of  tabernacles  (which  was  always  celebrated  in 
the  middle  of  that  month)  to  a  certain  season  of  the  year, 

b  Talmud  in  Rosh  Hashanah.  Maimonides  in  Kiddosh  Hachodesh.  Scali- 
ger  de  Emendatione  Temporum,  lib.  2,  c.  De  Anno  veterum  Habraeorum 
Autuinnali.  Josephus,  lib.  1,  c.4.  Marshami  Canon  Cliron.  p.  190.  Edit. 
Lips. 

c  Vide  Scaligerum  de  Emendatione  Temporum,  lib.  1.  c.  De  Anno,  et  c 
de  Periculo  Olympico  ;  etPetaviura  de  Doctrina  Temporum,  in  Paralip.  830 
Et  Rationar.  Temp,  part  2,  lib.  3.  c.  1. 


38-i  CO.NNEXIUN   OF   THE   HISTORY  OF  [PART   I. 

(as  halh  been  already  observed)  and  from  that  season  in  one 
year,  to  the  same  season  in  another,  can  only  be  measured  by 
the  course  of  the  sun  :  and  all  this  put  together  sufficiently 
shows,  that  lunar  years  are  not  the  years  which  this  prophecy 
is  to  be  computed  by. 

Another  way  taken  for  the  reconciling  of  this  difference, 
is  by  beginning  the  reign  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  nine 
years  sooner  than  where  it  is  above  placed  and  ending  the 
said  seventy  weeks  three  years  and  an  half  later,  that  is,  by 
putting  the  death  of  Christ  into  the  middle  of  the  last  week, 
and  continuing  the  remainder  of  that  week  beyond  it. 
For,  according  to  this  account,  the  first  year  of  Artaxei*xes 
Longimanus  will  fall  in  the  year  of  the  Julian  period  4241, 
and  his  twentieth  year  in  the  year  of  the  Julian  period 
4260  ;  from  which  numbering  sixty-nine  weeks  and  an  half, 
it  will  carry  down  the  computation  to  the  year  of  the  Julian 
period  4746.  which  was  the  very  year  on  which  Christ  suf- 
fered. And  thus  far  Petavius  and  archbishop  Usher  agree, 
as  to  the  time  both  of  the  begiiming  and  ending  of  the  pro- 
phecy, but  the)  differ  in  one  circumstance  about  the  begin- 
ning, that  is,  whether  this  twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes  Lon- 
gimanus, from  whence  they  both  reckon  this  beginning,  and 
which  they  both  put  in  the  same  year  of  the  Julian  period, 
were  his  twentieth  year  from  the  death  of  Xerxes  his  father, 
or  his  twentieth  year  from  the  time  when  it  is  supposed  he 
was  admitted  to  reign  in  copartnership  with  him,  nine  years 
before. 

For  Petavius  supposeth,  that  Xerxes,  nine  years  before  his 
death,  admitted  his  son  Artaxerxes  to  reign  in  copartnership 
with  him,  and  that  from  this  admission  is  to  be  computed  the 
twentieth  year  of  his  reign,  in  which  he  issued  out  the  de- 
cree from  whence  the  first  year  of  this  prophecy  did  com- 
mence.'^ ^\nd  he  builds  this  supposition  chiefly  upon  the 
authority  of  Thucydides,*^  who  tells  us,  that  Themistocles,  in 
his  flight  into  Persia,  addressed  himself  to  Artaxerxes,  then 
newly  reigning.  But  Diodorus  Siculus^  tells  us,  that  The- 
mistocles fled  into  Persia  in  the  second  year  of  the  seventy- 
seventh  Olympiad,  several  years  before  the  death  of  Xerxes  ; 
and  therefore  to  reconcile  these  two  authors,  Petavius  in- 
fers, that  Artaxerxes  must  have  been  admitted  to  reign  with 
his  father  several  years  before  his  death,  and  these  years 
he  determines  to  nine,  because  this  will  best  serve  his  pur- 
pose ;  and  to  support  this  supposition,  he  insists  on  the  usage 
anciently  in  practice  among  the  Persian  kings,  of  naming 

d  Rationar.     Temp,  part  2,  lib,  3.  c.  10,  p.  164,  Et.  de  doctrina  Tempo- 
rum,  lib.  12j  c.  32,  et  sequentia. 

eLib.  1.  f  Lib.  11. 


UOOK  V.J  THE  OLD  AND  K£W  TESTAMENTS.  365 

their  successors  before  they  went  to  any  dangerous  war, 
and  will  have  it,  that  w  hen  Xerxes^  again  renewed  the  war 
against  the  Greeks,  after  the  death  of  Pausanias,  he  then 
named  Artaxerxes  according  to  this  usage,  in  the  same  man- 
ner as  his  father  had  named  him  on  the  like  occasion,  and 
took  him  into  copartnership  with  him  in  the  government 
of  the  empire.  But  there  is  nothing  in  the  history  of  those 
times,  that  can  give  any  countenance  to  this  conjecture. 
Herodotus'*  indeed  tells  us  of  such  an  usage  among  the 
Persians,  as  is  above  mentioned,  but  this  was  only  to  name 
a  successor,  not  to  take  a  partner  into  the  government,  and 
this  according  to  that  usa<;e  was  then  only  to  be  done  when 
there  vvas  a  controversy  about  the  succession,  as  was  the  case 
when  Darius  named  Xerxes  his  successor  in  his  life-time ; 
but  we  are  told  of  no  such  controversy  about  the  succession 
in  Xerxes's  time.  And  it  is  plain  from  the  passage  in  Thu- 
cydides,  where  the  words  are  on  which  the  main  stress  of 
Petavius's  opinion  is  laid,  that  he  there  speaks  of  Artaxerxes, 
as  then  newly  reigning  after  his  father's  death:  and,  till  his 
father's  death,  he  could  scarce  be  of  an  age  proper  for  the 
receiving  of  such  an  address,  as  Themistocles  is  said  then 
to  have  made  unto  him  :  for  he  was  but  a  lad  when  his  fa- 
ther died,'  and  therefore  must  have  been  a  mere  child,  when, 
according  to  this  reckoning,  Themistocles  came  into  Persia. 
And  if  he  were  admitted  to  be  successor,  and  also  partner 
in  the  empire  before  his  elder  brother  Darius,  upon  the 
same  reason  that  Xerxes  was  before  his  elder  brother  Arta- 
basanes,  that  is,  because  he  was  born  after  his  father  came 
to  be  king,  and  the  other  before,  it  must  follow  then,  that 
in  the  second  year  of  the  seventy-seventh  Olympiad,  when 
Diodorus  Siculus  tells  us  Themistocles  came  to  the  Persian 
court,  he  could  be  at  the  most  but  fourteen  years  old  ;  for 
Xerxes  began  his  reign  but  fourteen  years  before.'^  And 
there  are  besides  many  other  inconsistencies  in  this  opinion  ; 
but,  what  hath  been  said,  is  sufficient  to  show,  that  it  can  af- 
ford no  sure  foundation  for  the  solution  of  any  part  of  this 
prophecy  upon  it. 

And  therefore  archbishop  Usher  takes  the  other  way,  and 
although  he  piaceth  the  twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes  Lon- 
gimanus  in  the  same  year  that  Petavius  doth,  in  order  to 
the  solutian  of  his  prophecy,  yet  he  doth  not  compute  it  any 
otherwise   than  from  the  death   of    Xerxes  his  father ;  so 

g  Justin,  lib.  2,  c.  15.    Thucydides,  lib.  1.    Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.   11. 
Plutarclius  in  Cimone. 
h  Lib.  7,  in  initio  libri. 

i  Justin  lib.  3,  c.  1.    Diodorus  Siculus,  lib.  11. 
k  Canon  Ptoleraaei. 

J  In  Annalibus  VeterisTestaincnti  sub  anno  Julianse  Period!-  245?. 
Vol.  T.  49 


38B  COiVNEXlOX  OF  THEHIaTOUY  OF  [pART  I. 

that  he  anticipates  the  true  twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes 
Longimanus  in  the  same  manner  as  Petavius  doth,  though 
not  by  joining  him  in  copartnership  with  his  father,  but  by 
putting  him  in  due  succession  after  him,  nine  years  sooner 
than  either  Ptolemy  or  any  other  author  doth;  and  the 
same  testimony  of  Thucydides  which  is  above  mentioned, 
is  the  ground  which  he  goes  upon  for  it.  And  therefore, 
to  reconcile  this  testimony  with  the  time  assigned  by  Diodo- 
rus  SicuUis,  for  the  flight  of  Themistocles,  which  is  above 
mentioned,  he  puts  the  death  of  Xerxes,  and  the  succession 
of  his  son  Artaxerxes,  nine  years  higher  up  than  any  other 
writer  doth  ;  and  to  patch  this  up  takes  nine  years  from  the 
reign  of  Xerxes,  and  adds  them  to  the  reign  of  Artaxerxes 
Longimanus,  his  son,  contracting  the  former  to  twelve  years, 
and  enlarging  the  latter  with  that  of  his  son  Xerxes  to  fifty. "^ 
In  allowing  no  other  beginning  to  the  reign  of  Artaxerxes 
Longimanus,  than  from  the  death  of  his  father,  the  most  learn- 
ed archbishop  is  most  certainly  in  the  right.  For  all  those 
among  the  ancients,  who  put  the  flight  of  Themistocles  in 
the  reign  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  suppose  it  to  be  after 
the  death  of  his  father,  but  in  no  other  particular  can  this 
opinion  be  justified  :  for,  1st,  in  contracting  the  reign  of  Xer- 
xes to  twelve  years,  and  enlarging  that  of  Artaxerxes  Lon- 
gimanus, and  his  son  Xerxes  to  fifty,  he  goes  contrary  to  all 
that  have  wrote  of  those  times,  whether  ancients  or  moderns  ; 
and  especially  to  Ptolemy,  who,Hn  his  canon,  assigns  twenty- 
one  years  to  Xerxes,  and  no  more  than  forty-one  to  Artax- 
erxes, including  the  short  reigns  of  Xerxes  and  Sogdianus 
Iiis  sons,  in  the  last  of  them."  And  although  the  authority 
of  Thucydides  be  great,  and  Plutarch  tells  us,  that  he  hath 
Charon  of  Lampsacus  also  on  his  side,"  yet  the  same  Plu- 
tarch, from  a  great  number  of  other  ancient  writers,  and  of 
as  good  authority,  concludes  the  contrary  :  but,  2dly,  al- 
though the  authority  of  Thucydides  and  Charon  of  Lampsa- 
cus should  be  allowed  to  be  incontestable,  and  all  other  au- 
thorities must  be  set  aside  to  make  room  for  theirs  ;  yet  this 
will  not  infer  that  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of  Artaxerxes 
Longimanus  must  therefore  be  put  nine  years  higher  than  all 
others  have  put  it,  since  the  matter  may  be  as  well  adjusted 
by  bringing  the  flight  of  Themistocles  nine  years  lower ; 
and  this  way  Mr.  Dodwell"  hath  followed,  and  it  is  much 

m  Xerxes,  the  son  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  reigned  after  his  father's 
death  only  forty-five  days,  and  Sogdianus,  another  of  Artaxerxes's  sons,  who 
succeeded  his  brother,  reigned  no  more  than  six  months  and  fifteen  days-; 
so  the  time  of  both  their  reigns,  amounting  to  no  more  than  eight  months, 
they  are  in  the  canon  of  Ptolemy  cast  into  the  last  year  of  Artaxerxes,  and 
neither  of  them  is  therein  made  mention  of.  m  Ibid. 

n  Platwchus  in  Themistocle.  o  In  Anualibtis  Thucydides. 


r.OOKV.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  387 

the  better  of  the  two.  For  this  only  lays  aside  the  authori- 
ty of  Diodorus  Siculus,  who  fixeth  the  flight  of  Themisto- 
cles  to  the  year  above  mentioned;  whereas  the  other  runs 
counter  to  that  of  all  others  that  have  wrote  of  the  matter 
which  it  relates  to.  But  that  which  looks  hardest  in  this 
opinion  is,  for  the  sake  of  any  historical  writer  to  lay  aside  the 
authority  of  Ptolemy's  canon,  which  is  built  upon  astrono- 
mical demonstrations.  Although  Thucydides  be  a  grave  au- 
thor, and  of  incontestable  authority  in  those  matters  of  the 
Peloponnesian  war  which  he  writes  of;  (for  they  were  done 
in  his  time,  and  he  was  near  at  hand  to  be  well  informed  of 
them,  and  he  himself  was  an  accurate  observer,)  yet  it  is 
possible  he  might  be  mistaken  in  what  he  tells  us  of  the  Per- 
sian affairs,  which  were  done  at  a  distance  (as  this  was,)  and 
before  his  time ;  for  he  was  just  born  when  this  flight  of 
Themistocles  happened. p  But  Ptolemy's  canon  being  fixed 
by  the  eclipses,  the  truth  of  it  may  at  any  time  be  demon- 
strated by  astronomical  calculations,  and  no  one  hath  ever 
calculated  those  eclipses,  but  hath  found  them  fall  right  in 
the  times  where  placed  ;  and  therefore,  this  being  the  surest 
guide  which  we  have  in  the  chronology,  and  it  being  also 
verified  by  its  agreement  every  where  with  the  holy  Scrip- 
tures, it  is  not,  for  the  authority  of  any  other  human  writing 
whatsoever,  to  be  receded  from. 

And,  as  these  two  great  men  have  been  thus  far  out  in 
placing  the  beginning  of  these  seventy  weeks,  so  have  they 
been  no  less  mistaken  in  the  fixing  the  end  of  them  :  for,  to 
make  up  the  thirteen  years  which  this  reckoning  fell  short 
of,  they  have  not  only  anticipated  the  beginning  of  these 
weeks  nine  years,  but  have  also  cut  them  short  three  years 
and  an  half  in  the  ending,  by  placing  the  death  of  Christ  in 
the  middle  of  the  last  week,  and  there  concluding  this  part 
of  the  prophecy  three  years  and  an  half  before  these  seven- 
ty weeks  are  fully  completed  ;  which  hath  this  great  objec- 
tion against  it,  that  it  drops  the  latter  half  part  of  the  last 
week  as  void,  and  of  no  significancy.  But  no  word  of  God 
is  given  in  vain ;  every  part  of  it  hath  its  significancy,  and 
every  word  of  prophecy  therein  contained  must  have  its 
completion.  For  what  our  Saviour  saith  of  the  law  is  also 
true  of  the   prophets  ;i  and,  as  not  one  jot  or  tittle  of  the 

p  According  to  Aulus  Gellius,  Thucydides  was  forty  years  old  wljen  the  Pe- 
loponnesian war  began  (A.  Gellius,  lib.  14,  c.  23.)  And  the  Peloponnesian 
war  beginning  towards  the  end  of  the  first  year  of  the  eighty-seventh  Olym- 
piad, reckoning  forty  years  upward  froni  thence,  the  first  of  them  will  end 
in  the  very  year  in  which,  Diodorus  tells  us,  Themistocles  made  hi«!  flight 
i.  e.  in  the  second  year  of  the  seventy-seventh  Olvmpiad. 

qMatt.  V.  IK 


388  CONNEXION  »e  the  history  of  [part  1. 

former  was  to  pass  without  being  fulfilled,  so  neither  can 
any  one  jot  or  tittle  of  the  latter  ever  pass  without  being 
accomplished.  And  therefore,  every  part  of  the  last  week 
of  this  prophecy,  that  is,  the  last  half  part  as  well  as  the 
first  half  part,  must  have  its  significancy,  and  also  its  com- 
pletion ;  and,  accordingly,  every  part  of  it  had,  as  well  as  all 
the  rest,  as  shall  be  hereafter  shown. 

By  all  this  it  appears,  that  none  of  those  ways  which  have 
been  taken  for  the  computing  of  those  seventy  weeks,  from 
the  twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  can  make  it 
agree  with  the  prophecy,  and  therefore  it  cannot  be  begun 
from  thence.  That  which  hath  made  so  many  fond  of  be- 
ginning the  computation  of  these  weeks  froni  the  twentieth 
year  of  this  king,  and  the  issuing  out  of  the  commission  then 
granted  by  him  to  Nehemiah,  is  the  agreeablencss  which  they 
think  is  between  the  prophecy  and  this  commission,  beyond 
what  they  find  in  any  of  the  three  other  grants  or  commis- 
sions above  mentioned  ;  for  the  prophecy  placeth  the  begin- 
ning of  the  seventy  weeks  at  the  going  forth  of  the  com- 
mandment to  restore  and  build  Jerusalem,  and  afterward 
makes  mention  of  the  building  of  the  streets  and  the  walls 
thereof;  and  both  these,  say  tlicy,  were  rebuilt  by  Nehemiah 
by  virtue  of  the  grant  made  to  him  in  the  twentieth  year  of 
this  Artaxerxes.  To  this  I  answer,  1st.  That  Ezra,  thir- 
teen years  before  this  grant  made  to  Nehemiah,''  speaks  of 
a  wall  in  Jerusalem  given  to  the  Jews  by  the  favour  of  the 
king  of  Persia  ;  and  therefore  this,  if  literally  taken,  may 
imply,  that  the  grant  made  to  Ezra  included  a  license  or 
commission  to  build  such  a  wall,  as  well  as  that  made  to  Ne- 
hemiah. But  if  it  be  said,  that  the  wall  mentioned  by  Ezra, 
in  the  place  which  I  refer  to,  is  to  be  taken  figuratively,  (as 
I  acknowledge  it  is,)  my  reply  hereto  is:  and  why  may  not 
then  the  word  zcall  in  the  prophecy  be  taken  figuratively 
also,  there  being  as  much  reason  for  it  in  the  one  place  as 
there  is  in  the  other  ?  But,  2dly.  There  is  no  such  word  as 
the  wall  to  be  found  in  the  original  text  of  (lie  prophecy  ;  for 
what  we  there  render,  in  our  English  translation,  the  runll,  is. 
in  the  Hebrew  original,  the  ditch.  3dly.  That  though  Nehe- 
miah did  much  enlarge  Jerusalem,  by  bringing  new  colonies 
of  the  Jews  thither  out  of  the  country,  and  obliging  them  to 
build  themselves  houses  and  dwell  there,  yet  tills  enlarging 
of  the  city  cannot  be  called  tlic  restoring  and  rebuilding  of 
it;  for  it  was  restored  and  rebuilt  long  before,  and  had  many 
streets  and  coiled  houses  again  erected  in  it.  by  virtue  of  the 

r  Ezra  \\.  9 


BOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND    NEW  TESTAMENTS.  389 

decree  granted  by  Cyrus,  as  hath  been  above  shown.^  And 
after  that,  from  time  to  time,  many  more  were  added  to  them 
by  virtue  of  the  same  decree,  ronfirmed  by  Darius  Hystas- 
pes  many  years  before  Nehcmiah  came  to  be  governor  of 
Judea.  4thly.  The  rebuilding  or  repairing  of  the  wails  of 
Jerusalem,  accomphshcd  by  Nehemiah.  was  a  work'  but  of 
tifty-two  da\s.'  and  the  enlarging  of  Jerusalem  with  new  co- 
lonies was  within  a  year  after  ;"  but  the  restoring  and  rebuild- 
ing of  Jerusalem,  predicted  by  the  prophecy,  was  to  be  u 
work  of  seven  weeks,  or  forty-nine  years,  and  so  long  first 
Ezra,  and  after  Nehemiah,  laboured  successively  in  the  work 
of  restoring  and  rebuildmg  the  church  and  state  of  the  Jews 
at  Jerusalem,  as  will  hereafter  be  show;,  :  and  therefore  of 
this  restoring  and  rebuilding  onl}  can  the  prophecy  be  un- 
derstood. 

And  thus  far  having  shown  that  the  commandment  or  de- 
cree mentioned  in  the  prophecy  for  the  restoring  and  re- 
building of  Jerusalem,  cannot  be  understood  either  of  the  de- 
cree of  Cyrus,  or  of  that  of  Darius,  or  of  that  granted  to  Ne- 
hemiah in  the  twentieth  year  of  Artaxerxes,  it  remains,  that 
it  must  then  be  understood  of  that  granted  to  Ezra  by  the 
same  Artaxerxes,  in  the  seventh  year  of  his  reign,  and  ol 
none  other.  For  besides  the  three  commandments  or  decrees 
above  mentioned,  there  was  no  othercommandment  or  decree 
ever  granted  by  any  of  the  kings  of  Persia,  for  the  restora- 
tion of  the  Jews  in  Judah  and  Jerusalem,  after  the  Baby- 
lonish captivity,  but  this  only  that  was  granted  to  Ezra. 
And  therefore,  if  it  cannot  be  understood  of  any  of  the  otiier 
three,  it  must  then  necessarily  be  this  fourth  and  none  other. 
And  from  thence  to  the  death  of  Christ  are  exactly  four 
hundred  and  ninety  years  to  a  month  ;  for  in  the  month 
Nisan  was  the  decree  granted  to  Ezra,  and  in  the  middle  of 
the  same  month  Nisan,  Christ  suffered  just  four  hundred  and 
ninety  years  after.'' 

VI.  And  thus  much  being  said  for  the  fixing  of  the  bcirin- 
ning  and  ending  of  these  seventy  weeks,  it  remains  that, 
for  the  fuller  explication  of  all  other  particulars  that  are  in 
this  propficcy  tiontained,  1  farther  obscive,  that  the  whole 
of  it,  as  delivered  to  us  in  the  twenty-fourth,  tvvcnty-fit'th. 
twenty-sixth,  and  twentyge\enth  verses  of  the  ninth  chap- 
ter of  Daniel,  contains  three  branches  or  parts  ;  the  first 
foretells  events  to  be  accomplished  within  seventy  weeks  in 
general,  and  to  be  fully  completed  and  brought  to  pass  at 
the  end  of  them  ;  the  second,    events  to  be  accomplished 

3  Hag.  i.4.  t  iSeli.vi.  lo.  u  Neh.  vii. 

X  For  Christ  was  crucified  in  the  bei^inning  of  the  Jewish  passover.  and 
■•bat  ahvavs  besan  in  (he  middle  of  Ihp  monlli  Nisati. 


390  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

precisely  at  the  end  of  three  particular  periods,  into  which 
the  said  general  number  of  seventy  weeks  is  divided ;  and 
the  third,  events  to  be  brought  to  pass  after  the  expiration 
of  the  said  seventy  weeks  in  the  times  immediately  following 
thereupon. 

I.  The  first  branch  or  part  of  this  prophecy  is  that  whicli 
is  contained  in  the  twenty-fourth  verse,  and  foretells  the  six 
events  above  mentioned,  which  were  to  be  accomplished 
within  the  said  seventy  weeks  in  general,  and  to  be  fully 
completed  and  brought  to  pass  at  the  end  of  them. 

II.  The  second  branch  or  part  of  this  prophecy  is  that 
which  is  contained  in  the  twenty-fifth  verse  and  in  the  former 
part  of  the  twenty-sixth  and  former  part  of  the  twenty- 
seventh  verses.  This  divides  the  general  number  of  seventy 
Aveeks  into  tliree  particular  periods,  and  assigns  particular 
events  to  be  precisely  accomplished  at  the  end  of  each  of 
them.  These  three  particular  periods  are  seven  weeks,  sixty- 
two  weeks,  and  one  week,  that  is,  forty-nine  years,  four 
hundred  and  thirty-four  years,  and  seven  years ;  and  the  par- 
ticular events  to  be  accomplished  at  the  end  of  each  of  them 
are,  1st.  The  restoring  and  building  of  the  street  and  ditch 
of  Jerusalem  in  troublous  times ;  2d.  The  coming  of  the 
Messiah ;  and,  3d.  His  confirming  of  the  covenant  of  the  gos- 
pel with  many  of  the  Jews  for  one  week,  his  causing  sacrifice 
and  oblation  to  cease  in  the  half  of  that  week,  and  his  being 
cut  otf  at  the  end  thereof.  And  therefore,  applying  these 
particular  events  to  their  proper  periods,  the  prophecy  will 
be  clearly  thus.  That,  numbering  the  said  seventy  weeks 
from  the  going  forth  of  the  commandment  or  decree  to  re- 
store and  build  Jerusalem  (that  is,  to  restore  and  establish  the 
church  and  state  of  the  Jews  at  Jerusalem.)  there  should 
be  first  seven  weeks  of  that  number,  that  is,  forty-nine  years, 
and  then  the  said  church  and  state  (here  figuratively  express- 
ed by  the  streets  of  the  city)  should  be  thoroughly  reform- 
ed and  restored,  and  all  such  good  constitutions  and  establish- 
ments (here  figuratively  expressed  by  the  ditch)  should  be 
made  and  settled,  as  should  be  necessary,  for  the  fortifying 
and  preserving  of  the  same  ;  and  that  all  this  should  be  done  in 
troublous  times,  and  amidst  great  opposition  from  enemies  : 
that,  after  sixty-two  weeks  from  the  end  of  the  said  seven 
weeks,  that  is,  four  hundred  and  thirty-four  years,  the 
Messiah  should  come  :  and  that  after  this,  having  for  one 
week,  the  last  of  the  said  seventy  weeks  (that  is,  for  the  space 
of  seven  years,)  confirmed  the  covenant  of  the  gospel  with 
many  of  the  Jews,  he  should,  in  the  half  part  of  that  week 
(that  is,  in  the  latter  half  part  of  it,)  cause  the  sacrifices  and 
oblations  of  the  temple  to  cease,  and.  in  the  conclusion  of 


BOOK  V.J  THE  OLD  AND  iiEW  TESTAMENTa.  391 

Ihe  whole,  that  is,  in  the  precise  ending  of  the  said  seventy 
weeks,  be  cut  off'  and  die.  And,  accordingly,  all  this  was 
exactly  fulfilled  and  brought  to  passJ 

1st.  As  to  the  period  of  seven  weeks,  it  must  be  acknow- 
ledged, that  the  particular  event  of  restoring  and  building 
of  Jerusalem,  with  its  streets  and  ditch,  in  troublous  times 
(by  which  I  understand  the  restoring  and  settling  of  the 
church  and  state  of  the  Jews,)  is  not  distinctly  applied  there- 
to in  the  prophecy  :  for,  in  the  end  of  the  twenty-tifth  verse, 
both  the  two  first  periods  being  mentioned  together,  that 
is,  that  of  the  seven  weeks,  and  that  of  the  sixty-two  weeks, 
the  event  of  restoring  and  building  of  Jerusalem,  with  its 
street  and  ditch  is  subjoined  to  both  of  them,  without  any 
distinct  application  to  either;  but  the  words  immediately 
following  in  the  next  verse  appropriating  the  time  of  the 
Messiah  to  the  period  of  sixty-two  weeks,  this  necessarily 
leaves  the  other,  that  is,  the  restoring  and  building  of  Jeru- 
salem, with  its  streets  and  ditch  to  be  appropriated  to  the  pe- 
riod of  seven  weeks.  And  accordingly,  within  the  compass 
of  the  said  period  of  seven  weeks,  or  forty-nine  years,  this 
event  was  accomplished,  in  the  full  restoring  and  establish- 
ing of  the  church  and  state  of  the  Jews  in  Judah  and  Jerusa- 
lem, after  the  Babylonish  captivity:  for  this  was  begun  by  Ezra, 
by  virtue  of  that  commandment  or  decree  which  was  granted 
to  him  for  it  in  the  seventh  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus^ 
king  of  Persia,  and  afterward  carried  on  by  Nehemiahy 
by  virtue  of  another  decree  granted  to  him,  for  this  purpose, 
by  the  same  Artaxerxes,  in  the  twentieth  year  of  his  reign. 
And  from  the  beginning  of  this  restoration  of  the  church 
and  state  of  the  Jews  by  Ezra,  to  the  ending  and  perfecting 
of  it  by  Nehemiah,  in  that  last  act  of  this  reformation 
which  is  spoken  of  in  the  thirteenth  of  Nehemiah,  (that  is^ 
from  the  twenty-third  verse  to  the  end  of  the  chapter^)  were 
forty-nine  years,  as  will  be  clearly  made  out,  in  its  proper 
place,  in  the  sequel  of  this  history.  For  during  all  that  time 
this  work  was  carrying  on,  and  the  great  opposition  which 
these  two  good  men  met  with  herein,  not  only  from  the  Sa- 
maritans and  other  enemies  abroad,  but  also  from  false  bre- 
thren and  wicked  men  at  home,  who  hated  all  reformation, 
was  the  true  cause  that  it  was  solong  in  doing;  that  there  were 
such  oppositions  in  the  doing  of  it,  this  sufficiently  verifieth 

y  It  is  a  celebrated  saying  among  the  Jews,  and  of  ancient  date  among 
th'  n  (tor  it  is  in  the  Pirke  Aboth,  which  is  one  of  the  tracts  in  their  Mishna,) 
*  That  the  constitution  of  their  elders  is  a  hedge  to  the  law,'  that  is,  to 
fence,  preserve,  and  keep  it  from  being  broken  in  upon  and  violated.  But  a 
ditch  is  as  much  made  use  of  for  a  fence  as  is  a  hedge;  and,  thepefore,  the 
constitutions  which  fence  the  law  from  being  violated  may  be  figurativelvr 
expressed  by  the  one  as  well  as  by  the  other. 


J^-J  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  Ot  [I'ART  I. 

the  prophecy  in  its  prediction,  ihat  it  was  to  be  done  in  trou- 
blous times.  And  it  is  observable,  that,  at  the  same  juncture 
of  time  where  the  restoration  oftlu'  Jewish  church  and  state 
ended,  there  the  holy  Scriptures  of  the  Old  Testament 
do  end  also  ;  for  this  last  reformation  of  Nehemiah  which  I 
have  mentioned,  and  where  1  place  the  full  completion  of 
the  said  restoration,  is  the  last  act  which  is  recorded  therein  ; 
and  therefore  this  ending  of  the  p(^riod  is  ofsufhcienl  remark 
for  this  reason,  as  well  as  the  other,  to  be  taken  notice  of  in 
the  prophecy  ;  which  can  scarce  be  said  of  any  other  that  is 
assigned  for  it.     And, 

2dly.   From  these  seven  weeks,  or  forty-nine  years,  reck- 
oning sixty-tvv'o  weeks,  or  four  hundred  and  thirty-four  years 
more,  (which  is  the  term  of   the  second   period,)  this  will 
lead  us  down  to  the  coming  of  Christ,  the  Messiah,   who  is 
here,  in  the  prophecy,  predicted  to  come  at  the  end  of  the 
said  sixty-two  weeks.      For  the  words  of  the  prophec}  are, 
From  the  goinc^  forth  of  the    commandment  to  restore  and  to 
build  Jerusalem,  unto  the  Messiah  the   Prince,  shall  be  seven 
weeks   and  threescore  and   tzco  zoceks ;  that  is,  there  shall    be 
seven  weeks  for  the  completing  and  finishing  of  the  work  for 
which  that  commandment  or  decree  was  granted,  and  from 
thence   sixty  two  weeks  more  to  the  coming  of  Christ  the 
Messiah  here  intended,  that  is,  to  the  time  of  his  tirst  ap- 
pearance on  the  ministry  of   the  gospel.     For  his  coming, 
here  predicted,  must  be  interpreted,  either  of  his  coming  at 
his  birth,  or  of  his  coming  on  his  ministry.     No  one  saith  it 
of  the  former,  neither  will  the  term  of  years  predicted  of  it 
ever  meet  it  there  :  and  therefore   it  must  be  understood 
of  the  latter,  that  is,  his  coming  and  first  appearing  in  his 
ministry  ;  and  here  the  years  predicted  in  the  prophecy  will 
exactly  find  it ;  for  the  seventh  year  of  A.rtaxerxcs   Longi- 
manus,  from  whence  these  weeks  do  begin,  being  coincident 
with  the  year  of  the  Julian  period  4256,  if  we  reckon  from 
thence  seven  weeks  and  sixty-two  weeks,  that  is,  sixty-nine 
weeks,  or  four  hundred  and  eighty-three  years,  this  will  lead 
us  down  to  the  year  of  the  Julian  period  4739,  which  was 
the  very  year  in  which  the  ministry  of  the  gospel  first  began. 
This  Christ  executed  at  first,  and  therein  made  his  appear- 
ance as  the  Messiah,  by  his  forerunner  John  the  Baptist,  for 
the  space  of  three  years  and  a  half,  and  after  that,  by  him- 
self  in   his   own  person,  for  three  years  and  a  half  more. 
And  these  two  being  put  together  make  up  the  last  week  of 
this  prophecy,  which  began  exactly  at  the  ending  of  the  said 
sixty-two  weeks.     And  therefore  here  the  prophecy  con- 
cerning the  coming  of  the  Messiah  had  its  completion.     St, 


SOOK  V.J     THE  OLl)  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  393 

Luke  tells  us,'*  "  The  word  of  God  first  came  to  John  in  the 
fifteenth  year  of  Tiberius  Caesar,"  emperor  of  Rome.  And 
from  the  coming  of  that  word  to  John,  and  his  preaching  of 
it  to  the  Jews,^  was  the  beginning  of  the  gospel  of  Jesus 
Christ,  and  the  first  appearance  of  his  kingdom  here  on 
earth.  And  this  Christ  himself  tells  us :  for  his  words  are, 
(Lukexvi.  16,)  "  The  law  and  the  prophets  were  until  John; 
since  that  the  kingdom  of  God  is  preached."  That  is,  the 
Jewish  economy,  under  the  law  and  the  prophets,  lasted 
until  the  coming  of  John,  and  his  preaching  of  the  baptism 
of  repentance  for  the  remission  of  sins.  But,  from  the  time 
of  his  coming  on  this  ministry,  which  was  the  ministry  of  the 
gospel,  the  kingdom  of  the  Messiah  began.  For  as,  in  the 
gospel  of  St.  Matthew,  by  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  so  here 
by  the  kingdom  of  God,''  is  meant  the  kingdom  of  the 
Messiah,  the  church  of  Christ,  which  he  hath  here  establish- 
ed among  us.  And  therefore,  this  kingdom  thus  beginning 
with  the  preaching  of  John,  there  must  we  necessarily  place 
the  first  coming  of  that  King,  Christ  our  Lord,  who  founded 
this  his  kingdom  here  among  us.  And  this  was,  as  hath 
been  said,  in  the  fifteenth  year  of  the  reign  of  Tiberius 
Caesar.  But  here  it  is  to  be  observed,  that  this  fifteenth  year 
of  Tiberius  could  not  be  his  fifteenth  year  from  tire  death  of 
Augustus,  his  predecessor;  for  then  there  would  have  been 
but  four  years  for  the  ministry  of  John  the  Baptist  and 
the  personal  ministry  of  Jesus  Christ  put  both  together ; 
which  time  would  have  been  too  narrow  a  space  for  the  act- 
ings which  are  recorded  of  them  in  the  gospel.  Besides,  in 
so  short  a  time  as  must  be  allowed  to  the  ministry  of  John 
in  this  case,  it  is  not  likely  that  he  could  have  acquired  so 
great  fame ;  as  appears  not  only  by  the  gospels,'^  but  also 
from  the  writing  of  Josephus  the  historian,*^  that  he  had  ob- 
tained, not  only  in  Judea  and  Galilee,  but  also  through  all 
the  circumjacent  regions  before  his  death.  The  fifteenth 
year,  therefore,  of  the  reign  of  Tiberius,®  in  v.'hich  John 
the  Baptist  began  to  preach,  must  be  reckoned  from  that 
time  when  he  began  to  reign  jointly  with  Augustus,  and  was, 
according  to   Velleius  Paterculus*^  and  Suetonius,^  admitted 

■A  Chap.  iii.  1,  2.  a  Mark  i.  1. 

h  Vide  Grotii  Annotationes  in  secundum  caput  Matthaei,  el  Lightfoot  Ho- 
ras  Hebraicas  ad  eundem  locum. 

c  Matt.  iii. ;  xiv.  5;  xxi.  26.  d  Antiq.  lib.  18,  c.  7. 

e  Luke  iii.  1. 

f  Lib.  2,  c.  121,  uhi  verba  faciens  de  Tiberio  baec  habet.  '  Senatus  popu- 
lusque  Romanus  postulante  patre  ejus  (sc.  Augusto)  ut  wquam  ei  jus  in  om- 
nibus provinciis  exercitibusque  esset,  quam  erat  ipsi  decreto  complexus  est.' 

g  In  Tiberio,  c.  21,  ubi  de  Tiberio  dicit, — '  Per  consules  lata,  ut  provincias 
cum  Augusto  communiter  administraret,  siraulquprrnsiira  ageret,  conditio 
!ustro  in  Illyricum  profectus  est.' 
Vol.  L  50 


394  COJINEXION  OF   THE  HISTORY   OF  [rART   I. 


«4 


by  him  into  copartnership  with  him  in  the  empire  •,  and,  by 
a  law,  (vviiich  Augustus  caused  to  be  proposed  and  enacted 
by  the  consuls.)  had  conferred  on  him  an  equal  power  in  the 
government  of  the  provinces  with  Augustus  himself:  for 
from  that  time  the  public  acts  went  in  his  name,  as  well  as 
in  that  of  Augustus,  especially  in  the  imperial  provinces,"* 
of  which  Syria  was  one  :  and  therefore  from  that  time  the 
years  of  his  reign  were  reckoned  in  those  provinces.  And 
this  happened,  as  the  most  learned  archbishop  Usher  ob- 
serves, in  the  year  of  the  Julian  period  4725  ;'  and  the  fif- 
teenth year  from  thence  brings  us  to  the  year  of  the  Julian 
period  4739,  in  which,  (as  is  above  noted.)  the  word  of  God 
came  to  John  the  Baptist ;  and  the  preaching  of  the  gospel 
first  began.  And  then  it  was,  that  Christ,  by  this  his  fore- 
runner, manifested  his  coming,  and  made  his  first  appear- 
ance in  that  great  work  of  our  salvation,  on  which  he  was 
sent.  And  from  the  seventh  year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus, 
when  the  commandment  went  forth  from  that  king  for  the 
restoring  of  the  church  and  state  of  the  Jews,  to  this  time, 
were  just  seven  weeks,  and  sixty-two  weeks,  that  is,  sixty- 
nine  weeks,  or  four  hundred  and  eighty-three  years  in  all 
exactly  as  this  prophecy  predicted. 

3dly.  From  this  coming  of  our  Saviour  began  the  third 
period  of  these  seventy  weeks,  that  is,  the  one  week  which 
is  spoken  of  in  the  twenty-seventh  verse ;  the  events 
whereof,  as  there  predicted,  are,  that  for  that  week  the 
Messiah  should  confirm  the  covenant  with  many,  and  in  the  half 
■part  thereof  (for  thus  it  ought  to  be  rendered,  where  in  our 
English  translation  we  read  the  midsi,^)  should  cause  the 
sacrifice  and  the  oblation  to  cease.  And  so  accordingly  it 
came  to  pass  ;  for,  during  these  seven  years  of  his  evangeli- 
cal ministry,  he  did,  first  by  his  forerunner,*  the  messenger 
whom  he  had  sent  before  him,  and  then  by  himself,  in  his 
personal  ministry,  confirm  the  covenant  of  the  gospel  with 
many  of  the  Jews,  who  were  converted,  and  admitted 
thereto  ;  and  then,  in  the  half  part  of  the  said  week,  that  is, 
in  the  last  half  part  thereof,  when  he  appeared  in  his  own 
person  in  the  same  ministry  on  which  John  was  sent  before 
him,  he  caused  the  sacrifices  and  the  oblations  of  the  temple 
to  cease,  that  is,  first  by  his  preaching  of  the  gospel,  which 
was  to  supersede  them,  and  then,  lastly,  by  that  great  sacri- 
fice of  himself,  which  he  once  oflered  for  all,  in  his  death 
upon  the  cros^,  at  the  end  of  this  week,  whereby  they  were 

b  Dio  Cassius.  i  In  Annalibiis  sub  anno  J.  P.  47:25. 

kThe   word  in  the  original  Hebrew  is  Chatzi,  which  signifieth  liie  ball 
part,  and  not  the  midst. 

I  Mai.  iii.  ].     Matt.  xi.  10.     Luke  i.  TG :  vii.  27. 


IJOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  395 

all  absolutely  and  finally  extinguished  for  ever.  For  all 
other  sacrifices  and  oblations  till  then  being  only  types  and 
figurative  representations  of  this  great  sacrifice  after  to  be 
oflTered,  and  of  no  virtue  or  efficacy  but  as  they  referred  to 
it;  when  this  was  offered,  all  others  vanished  of  course,  as 
the  representative  doth  at  the  appearance  of  the  principal, 
or  the  type  or  figure  at  the  presence  of  the  thing  that  is 
typified  or  expressed  by  it;  and/the  virtue  and  propitiation 
of  this  one  sacrifice  hath  sufficed  for  all  ever  since.  The 
whole  latter  part  of  the  last  week  being  the  time  of  Christ's 
personal  ministry  here  on  earth,  as  the  whole  of  it  v/as  em- 
ployed in  preaching  of  the  gospel,  which  was  to  cause  the 
law  to  cease  ;  so  the  whole  of  it  may  very  properly  be  said 
to  be  employed  in  causing  all  those  sacrifices  and  oblations 
to  cease,  which  the  law  enjoined ;  though  the  whole  was  not 
completed  till  at  the  end  of  this  half  part,  by  his  death  and 
passion ;  for  then,  at  the  offering  up  of  this  great  sacrifice, 
the  virtue  and  efficacy  of  all  others  ceased  for  ever.  But 
here  it  may  be  objected,  that  my  placing  the  death  of  Christ 
at  the  end  of  this  last  period  is  against  the  express  words  of 
the  prophecy  ;  for  that  placeth  the  cutting  off  of  the  Messiah 
at  the  end  of  the  second  period,  that  is,  of  the  sixty-two 
weeks ;  for  the  words  of  it  are,  (v.  26,)  After  threescore  and 
iwo  weeks  shall  Messiah  be  cut  off.  To  this  I  answer,  the  word 
after,  in  this  place,  cannot  be  understood  to  mean  strictly  the 
time  immediately  after,  but  in  a  large  and  indefinite  sense  to 
denote  the  whole  next  week  which  after  followed  ;  for  other- 
wise his  coming  and  his  cutting  off  must  have  happened  at  the 
same  time  both  together,  and  no  intermediate  space  would 
have  been  left  for  his  ministry  :  for  in  the  verse  preceding  it  is 
positively  said.  That  from  the  going  forth  of  the  commandment 
to  restore  and  build  Jerusalem,  unto  the  Messiah  the  Prince,  shall 
be  seven  weeks  and  threescore  ana  trco  weeks  ;  and  therefore,  if 
at  the  end  of  the  same  sixty-two  weeks  he  should  be  cut  off 
also,  thou  his  coming  and  his  cutting  off  must  have  happened 
both  together  at  the  same  time  ;  and  the  consequence,  which 
I  have  mentioned,  must  necessarily  follow,  i.  e.  that  no 
intermediate  space  would  have  then  been  left  for  his  ministry ; 
which  cannot  be  said.  The  word  after  must  therefore  mean 
the  whole  week  after,  at  the  end  of  which  Christ,  the  Mes- 
siah named  in  that  prophecy,  was  cut  off  by  his  death  on  the 
cross.  And  there  is  no  need  of  expressing  it  otherwise  in 
that  place,  because  the  cutting  off  and  death  of  the  Messiah 
had  been  exactly  determined  to  that  time  by  what  was  said 
before  in  the  twenty-fourth  verse.  For  it  is  manifest,  that 
according  to  the  true  intent  and  meaning  of  that  part  of  the 
prophecy,  his  death  must  be  there  placed :  for.  according  to 


30b"  ee.VXEXIOX  OF  THE  HISTORV  Or  [PAK7  i. 

that,  it  must  bo  there  placed  where  it  placeth  the  events  that 
were  to  be  accomplislicd  and  brought  to  pass  l)y  it:  but  the 
events  which  were  (o  be  accornphshed  and  brought  to  pass  by 
the  cutting  olTof  the  Messiah,  are  by  that  part  oi'  the  said  pro- 
phecy (v.  2 1,)  placed  at  the  end  of  the  seventy  weeks,  and 
consequently  al  the  end  of  the  last  of  them  •,  and  therefore 
the  cutting  off  of  the  Messiah  must  be  there  placed  also. 
And  there  it  accordingly  happened  in  the  death  and  passion 
of  Christ  our  Saviour;  and  this  part  of  the  prophecy  was 
exactly  fulfilled  by  it. 

The  whole,  therefore,  of  this  second  part  or  branch  of  the 
prophecy  is  thus :  the  seventy  weeks  being  divided  into  three 
periods,  that  is,  into  seven  weeks,  sixty-two  weeks,  and  one 
week  ;  the  first  rcacheth  from  the  time  of  the  going  forth  of 
the  commandmcr}t  to  Ezra,  for  the  restoring  of  the  church 
and  state  of  the  Jews,  in  the  seventh  year  of  Artaxerxes 
Longimanus,  to  the  finishing  of  that  work  by  Nehemiah,  forty- 
r.ine  years  after;  the  second,  from  the  end  of  that  period,  to 
the  coming  of  the  Messiah,  four  hundred  and  thirty-four 
years  after;  and  the  last  from  that  of  his  coming,  to  his 
cutting  off  by  his  death  on  the  cross  ;  which  was  one  week 
or  seven  years  after.  And  all  these  put  together,  fully  make 
up  the  seventy  weeks,  or  the  four  hundred  and  ninety  years 
of  this  prophecy  ;  and  according  to  this  computation  every 
particular  of  it  hath  been  fully  verified  in  the  completion 
exactly  agreeable  thereto,  and  the  whole  number  of  years 
pointed  out  thereby  exactly  answered  to  a  month  :  for  as 
the  going  out  of  the  commandment  to  Ezra,  from  whence 
they  began,  was  in  the  month  of  Nisan,  so  the  crucifixion  of 
Christ  was  also  in  the  same  month,  just  four  hundred  and 
ninety  years  after. 

III.  After  what  is  predicted  of  these  three  periods,  follows 
the  third  branch,  or  part  of  the  prophecy  which  is  contained 
in  the  latter  end  of  the  twenty-sixth,  and  latter  end  of  the 
twenty-seventh  verses,  and  foretells  events  to  be  brought 
to  pass,  after  the  expiration  of  the  said  seventy  weeks,  in 
the  times  immediately  following  thereupon,  that  is,  the  des- 
truction of  the  city  and  sanctuary  by  the  people  of  the  prince 
thai  xvas  to  come,  who,  with  their  armies,  and  desolating 
abominations,  should  invade  Judea,  as  with  a  flood,  and  by 
a  terrible  and  consuming  war,  bring  utter  ruin  and  desolation 
upon  it,  and  all  the  people  of  the  Jews  that  should  dwell 
therein,  and  consummate  the  same  upon  them  in  an  absolute 
destruction.  All  which  accordingly  came  to  pass,  and  did, 
in  a  very  signal  manner,  verify  the  prophecy  in  a  full  com- 
pletion in  every  particular  hereof.  For  at  the  end  of  these 
seventy  week?  which  were  determined  upon  that  people. 


BOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  397 

and  their  holy  city,  they  having  slain  the  Lord  of  life,  they 
were  thereon  cast  off  by  God  from  bein^  his  peculiar  people, 
and  the  Gentiles  were  called  in  their  stead ;  so  that  thence- 
forth they  were  no  more  his  people,  nor  their  city  Jerusalem 
any  longer  holy  unto  him,  but  both  were  given  up  and  des- 
tined to  utter  ruin  and  destruction  :  for,  immediately  on 
their  having  executed  the  sentence  of  death  upon  Christ  our 
Lord,  this  sentence  of  condemnation  passed  upon  them  ;"" 
and  from  that  time  all  second  causes  operated  towards  the 
hastening  the  execution  of  it,  till  at  length  the  Roman  armies 
the  people  that  were  to  come,  under  the  command  of  Titus 
their  prince,  invaded  them  as  with  a  torrent,  and  begirt  Je- 
rusalem with  their  ensigns,  the  abomination  of  desolation^^ 
which  our  Saviour,  from  this  prophecy,  forewarns  his  disciples 
of.  For  they  w^ere  idolatrous  images,"  abominated  by  the 
Jews,P  under  which  those  people  marched  against  them,  in- 
vaded their  land,  besieged  their  holy  city,  and  by  a  most 
calamitous  war,  brought  utter  desolation  upon  both  ;  which, 
according  to  the  relations  of  Josephus,  (who  was  an  histo- 
rian of  their  own  nation,  and  present  in  all  the  actions  of 
the  war.)  they  executed  it  in  the  most  terrible  and  tragical 
manner  of  destruction  that  was  ever  brought  tipon  any  na- 
tion, and  consummated  it  to  such  a  degree  upon  them,  that 
they  have  never  been  able  to  recover  themselves  ever  since 
even  to  this  day,  though  now  sixteen  hundred  and  forty-five 
years  have  passed  since  these  judgments  were  by  the  just 
hand  of  God  thus  executed  upon  them. 

But  for  the  full  clearing  of  all  that  hath  hitherto  been  said 
in  the  explication  of  this  prophecy,  there  still  remains 
one  great  objection  to  be  answered.  For  it  is  urged,  that 
the  Artaxerxes  who  granted  the  commission  to  Ezra  in  the 
seventh  year  of  his  reign,  from  whence  we  begin  the  com- 
putation of  the  seventy  weeks,  was  the  same  Artaxerxes  who, 
in  the  twentieth  year  of  his  reign,  granted  another  commis- 

m  Christ,  foreknowing  the  wickedness,  foretells  (hat  this  sentence  should 
be  thereon  passed  upon  them  for  it,  and  accordingly  be  executed,  Matt.  xiv. 
Mark  xiii.     Lukexxi. 

D  Matt.  xxiv.  15.     Mark  xiii.  14. 

o  Vide  Grotii  Annotationes  ad  24,  c.  Matt.  com.  15. 

p  Josephus  tells  us,  (Antiq.  lib.  18,  c.  7.)  that  when  Vitellias,  governor  of 
Syria,  was  going  to  pass  through  Judea  with  a  Roman  army  to  make  war 
against  the  Arabians,  the  chief  of  the  Jews  met  him,  and  earnestly  entreated 
him  to  lead  his  array  another  way.  For  they  could  not  bear  the  sight  of 
those  images,  which  were  in  the  ensigns  under  which  they  marched,  they 
were  so  abominated  by  them.  These  ensigiis,  thereftre,  for  the  sake  of 
those  images  in  them,  were  abominations  to  the  Jews;  and,  by  reason  of 
the  desolations  which  were  wrought  under  them  by  the  Roman  armies  in 
conquered  countries,  they  were  called  desolating  abominations,  or  abomi- 
nations of  desolation  ;  and  they  were  never  more  so,  than  when  under  them 
the  Roman  armies  besieged,  took,  and  destroyed  Jerusalem. 


SSR  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

sion  to  Nehemiah  ;  for  the  Scriptures,''  making  Ezra  ai)d 
Nehemiah  contemporary,  render  this  beyond  dispute.  But 
that  this  Artaxerxes  should  be  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  the 
age  which  Nehemiah  and  Sanballat  must  then  have  hved  to, 
makes  it,  they  say,  wholly  improbable  :  for  Nehemiah,  in  the 
book  of  holy  Scripture  called  by  his  name,  (which  all  ac- 
knowledge to  have  been  written  by  him,)  speaking  of  the 
reign  of  Darius  Codomannusking  of  Persia,  and  of  the  days  of 
Jaddua  the  high-priest  of  the  Jews,  as  of  times  past,  he  must 
have  been  alive  after  the  death  of  both  of  them  ;"■  but  Jad- 
dua not  dying  till  two  years  after  the  death  of  Alexander  the 
Great,^  in  the  year  of  the  Julian  period  4392,  from  the  twen- 
tieth year  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  to  that  time  had  passed 
one  hundred  and  twenty-three  years;  to  which  if  we  add 
thirty  years  more  for  the  age  of  Nehemiah,  when  he  came 
to  be  governor  of  Judea,  (which  is  the  least  that  can  be 
allowed  to  qualify  him  for  such  a  trust)  he  must  have  been  at 
the  least  one  hundred  and  fifty-three  years  old  when  he  wrote 
that  book,  if  the  Artaxerxes  from  whom  he  had  his  commis- 
sion were  Artaxerxes  Longimanus.  And  though  we  sup- 
pose the  writing  of  this  book  to  have  been  while  Darius 
Codomannus  and  Jaddua  were  both  alive,  and  put  it  up  as 
high  as  we  can,  that  is,  in  the  first  year  of  the  reign  of  that 
Darius,  yet  this  will  not  much  mend  the  matter  :  for  on  this 
supposition„Nehemiah  must  have  been  one  hundred  and  forty 
years  old  when  he  wrote  that  book  ;  which  is  still  a  very  im- 
probable age  in  those  times,  and  consequently  infers  the  sup- 
posal  on  which  it  is  built,  (that  is,  that  it  was  Artaxerxes  Lon- 
gimanus, from  whom  he  had  his  commission)  to  be  very  im- 
probable also.  And  the  age  of  Sanballat,  upon  the  same 
supposal,  will  not  only  be  as  improbable,  but  also  much 
more  so  ;  for  when  Nehemiah  came  into  Judea,  in  the  twen- 
tieth year  of  Artaxerxes,  he  found  him  governor  of  Samaria, 
under  the  king  of  Persia,*  and  he  was  alive,  as  Josephus 
tells  us,"  till  the  besieging  of  Gaza  by  Alexander  the 
Great,  in  the  fourth  year  of  Darius  Codamannus,  at  which 
time  he  died.  And  therefore,  if  that  Artaxerxes  were  Ar- 
taxerxes Longimanus,  Sanballat,  at  the  time  of  that  siege, 
could  not  be  less  than  one  hundred  and  forty-eight  years  old. 
For  from  the  twentieth  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  to  the 
fourth  of  Darius  Codomannus,  according  to  Ptolemy's  canon, 
were  one  hundred  and  thirteen  years ;  and  when  Nehemiah 
came  to  Jerusalem,  Sanballat  having  been  for  some  time, 
perchance   for  several  years,  fixed  in  the  government  of 

q  Nehemiah  viii.  r  Nehemiah  xii.  22. 

s. Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11.  c.  8.  Cbronicon  Alexand. 

T  Nehemiah  iv,  2.  u  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11)  c.  8. 


BOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  399 

Samaria,  he  cannot  be  well  supposed  to  have  been  less  than 
thirty-five  years  old  at  that  time  ;  and,  putting  both  these 
numbers  together,  they  make  one  hundred  and  forty-eight 
years ;  and  both  these  ages,  that  is,  that  of  Nehemiah,  and  this 
of  Sanballat,  it  must  be  acknowledged,  seem  very  improbable, 
and  more  especially  that  of  the  latter :  for  as  to  Nehefniah, 
an  extraordinary  blessing  upon  that  good  man  may  be  alleged 
for  such  an  extraordinary  age  in  him  ;  but  this  cannot  be  said 
of  the  other.  Each  of  these  instances  apart  look  very  im- 
probable ;  but  coming  both  together  are  much  more  so. 
And  therefore,  as  we  have  argued  above,  that  the  Darius  who 
granted  the  decree  for  the  finishing  of  the  temple,  could  not 
be  Darius  Nothus,  because  of  the  great  and  improbable  age 
which  Jeshuaand  Zerubbabel  must  have  been  of  at  the  exe- 
cuting of  that  decree  ;  so  it  is  argued  here,  in  the  same  man- 
ner, that  the  Artaxerxes,  from  whom  Ezra  and  Nehemiah  had 
their  commissions,  could  not  be  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  be- 
cause of  the  great  and  improbable  age  which  Nehemiah  and 
Sanballat  must  then  have  been  of  at  the  time  of  their  death  : 
and  therefore,  as  we  have  said  of  the  former  difficulty,  that 
it  can  be  no  otherwise  solved,  but  by  making  the  Darius 
who  granted  the  decree  for  the  finishing  of  the  temple  to  be 
another  Darius,  that  is,  Darius  Hystaspes,  who  reigned  nine- 
ty-eight years  before  that  Darius  who  was  called  Nothus ; 
so,  in  like  manner,  it  is  said  of  this  latter  difficulty,  that  it 
can  be  no  otherwise  cleared,  but  by  making  the  Artaxerxes, 
who  in  the  seventh,  and  in  the  twentieth  years  of  his  reign 
granted  his  commissions  to  Ezra  and  Nehemiah,  to  have 
been  another  Artaxerxes,  that  is,  Artaxerxes  Mnemon,  whose 
seventh  year,  and  whose  twentieth  year  of  his  reign  were 
just  sixty  years  after  the  seventh  year,  and  the  twentieth 
year  of  the  reign  of  the  other  Artaxerxes  that  was  called 
Longimanus.  Thus  far  the  objection  ;  and,  if  it  holds  good, 
I  must  acknowledge,  it  overthrows  the  computation  on  which 
hath  been  built  all  which  I  have  hitherto  said  for  the  expli- 
cation of  this  prophecy. 

In  answer  hereto,  it  hath  been  said  by  some,  1st.  As  to 
Nehemiah,  that  in  that  passage  of  his  book,  (ch.  xii.  22,) 
where  the  reign  of  Darius  the  Persian,  and  the  days  of  Jad- 
dua  the  high-priest  of  the  Jews,  are  mentioned,  that  reign 
of  Darius  was  the  reign  of  Darius  Nothus,^  and  those  days  of 
Jaddua  were  his  days  from  his  birth  :  which  might  very  well 
have  happened  in  the  reign  of  the  said  Darius  Nothus ;  and, 
2dly.  As  to  Sanballat,  that  there  were  two  of  that  name, 
the  first  of  which  was  the  Sanballat  spoken  of  by  Nehemiah, 

X  Usserius  in  Annalibus  sub  anno  Julianse  PerJodi,4298. 


400  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTOKY  OF  [PART  I. 

and  the  second  the  Sanballat  spoken  of  by  Josephus.^     But 
neither  of  these  answers  can  possibly  hold  good.     For, 

1st.  It  is  manifest,  that  the  text  of  Nehemiah  (ch.  xii.  22.) 
where  the  Levites  are  spoken  of  that  were  in  the  days  of 
Eliashib,  Joiada,  Johanan,  and  Jaddua,  cannot  be  under- 
stood to  mean  any  other  days  than  those  wherein  they 
were  high-priests.  For  the  high-pnet-t  amoiiji  the  Jews  was 
the  head  of  the  priests  and  Levites;  and  after  the  captivi- 
ty, when  there  was  no  king  in  Judah.  he  had  the  ibsolute 
supremacy  over  them  in  all  affairs  relating  to  their  office. 
And  therefore  it  was  then  as  proper  for  them  to  reckon  all 
such  atTairs  by  the  times  of  their  high-priests,  as  it  is  now 
with  us  to  reckon  all  actions  in  a  state  by  the  times  of  our 
kings ;  and  consequently,  when  any  thing  is  said  to  have  been 
done  in  such  an  high-priest's  time,  it  is  altogether  as  impro- 
per to  understand  it  of  any  other  time  than  that  of  his  high- 
priesthood,  as  it  would  be,  when  any  thing  is  said  to  have 
been  in  such  a  king's  time,  to  understand  it  of  any  other  time 
than  that  of  his  reign  :  and  therefore,  to  refer  what  is  here 
said  of  the  days  of  Jaddua,  as  far  back  as  to  his  days  from  his 
birth,  is  a  very  forced  sense,  which  the  text  cannot  naturally 
bear.  When  such  a  thing  is  said  to  have  been  in  the  time 
of  king  Henry  VI 11,  will  any  one  understand  it  of  the  time 
before  his  reign,  or  think  it  any  other  than  an  absurdity 
so  to  construe  it  ?  And  is  it  not  altogether  as  absurd  to 
understand,  what  is  here  said  of  the  Levites  to  have  been  in 
the  days  of  Jaddua,  of  any  other  days  than  of  those  wherein 
he  was  high-priest  ?  And  it  is  to  be  here  observed,  that  the 
text  joins  with  the  days  of  Jaddua  the  days  of  Eliashib,  Joi- 
ada, and  Johanan  :  for  it  is  said,  "In  the  days  of  Eliashib, 
Joiada,  Johanan,  and  Jaddua,"  &ic.^  And  therefore,  if  it 
should  be  here  asked,  whether  the  days  of  Eliashib,  Joiada, 
and  Johanan,  are  to  be  understood  of  the  days  of  their  high- 
priesthood,  or  of  the  days  of  their  life  from  their  birth  ?  no 
doubt  it  will  be  answered  by  every  body,  of  the  days  of  their 
high-priesthood.  And  why  then  must  not  the  days  of  Jad- 
dua be  understood  so  too  ?  It  may  farther  be  added,  what 
need  is  there  in  this  case  to  name  Jaddua's  days  at  all  ?  be- 
cause if  they  be  understood  of  those  before  he  was  high- 
priest,  they  were  coincident  with  the  days  of  Joiada  and 
Johanan,  which  were  named  before.  And  therefore,  if  we 
understand  those  days  of  Jaddua  in  the  text,  of  any  other  days 
than  of  those  wherein  he  was  high-priest,  they  must  have 
been  named  twice  in  the  same  text ;  which  would  be  such  a 
faulty  repetition,  as  it  must  not  be  charged  with.     Nothing 

y  Isaacas  Vossius  in  Cbronologia  sacra,  p.  Hi'. 
t:  Nehemiah  sii.  22. 


BOOK  V.^       THE  OLD  AND  XEVV  TESTAMENTS.  40] 

seems  more  plain,  than  that  the  text  speaks  of  the  days 
of  these  four  nien,  as  in  succession  one  after  another;  and 
therefore  we  must  not  run  the  days  of  one  into  the  days  of 
the  other.  Besides  the  whole  design  of  interpreting  the  days 
of  Jaddua  in  this  text,  of  the  days  before  he  was  high-priest, 
is  to  support  a  notion,  that  the  said  text  was  written  before 
he  was  high-priest,  and  so  far  back  as  the  time  immediately 
after  his  birth,  about  the  latter  end  of  the  reign  of  Darius  No- 
thus  ;  they  who  are  the  patrons  of  this  notion  having  no  other 
way  to  make  them  contemporary.  But  then,  to  name  his  days 
with  the  days  of  the  other  high-priests,  so  many  years  be- 
fore he  came  to  be  high-priest,  and  when  it  must  be  in  many 
I'espects  uncertain  whether  he  would  ever  be  so  or  not,*  is 
what  all  the  writings  in  the  world  besides  cannot  give  us  an 
instance  of.  From  all  this  it  plainly  follows,  that  those  days 
of  Jaddua,  in  the  text  above  mentioned,  can  be  meant  of 
no  other  days  than  the  days  of  his  high-priesthood  ;  and 
that  therefore  he  must  have  been  in  that  oftice  before  this 
text  was  written.  And  also  it  is  evident,  that  the  Darius  in 
the  same  text  mentioned,  can  be  none  other  than  Darius  Co- 
domannus,  in  whose  reign  Jaddua  was  high-priest.^  For  the 
text  bringing  down  the  reckoning  through  the  succession  of 
several  high-priests,  terminates  the  whole  in  the  days  of  Jad- 
dua, and  the  reign  of  Darius  the  Persian,  which  clearly  makes 
them  contemporary.  And  therefore  Darius  the  Persian, 
in  that  text  mentioned,  could  be  none  other  than  Darius  Co- 
domannus,  because  no  other  Darius  but  he  was  king  of  Per- 
sia while  Jaddua  was  high-priest  at  Jerusalem.  And,  if  so, 
it  must  be  in  the  reign  of  this  Darius,  of  the  soonest,  that 
this  text  was  written,  and  consequently  Nehemiah,  if  he  were 
the  writer  of  it,  must  then  have  been  living.  And,  suppo- 
sing it  to  have  been  in  the  reign  of  this  Darius,  and  in  the 
first  year  of  it,  Nehemiah,  if  then  living,  must  have  been 
one  hundred  and  forty  years  old;  but  if  it  were  after  the  death 
both  of  Darius  and  Jaddua,  as  the  obvious  sense  of  the  text 
seems  to  imply,  he  must  then  have  been  much  older,  that  is, 
one  hundred  and  fifty-three  at  the  least,  as  I  have  above  said. 
But  neither  of  these  is  likely  ;  and  therefore  it  must  be  ac- 
knowledged, that  this  answer  doth  not  remove  the  difficulty. 
Neither, 

2dly.  Can  the  other  answer  remove  that  which  ariseth 
from  the  age  of  Saaballat.  For,  to  solve  that  objection,  by 
making  two  Sanballats,  is  plainly  giving  up  the  cause  ;  it  be- 

a  It  was  uncertain,  not  only  from  the  uncertainty  of  life,  but  also  because 
he  might  in  the  interim  have  incurred  an  incapacity  by  being  maimed,  or 
otherwise,  and  also  might  be  excluded  by  the  Persian  king. 

b  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c  8.  c  Neh.  xii.  23. 

Vol.  I.  51 


402  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OP  [PART  J. 

ing  only  a  shift,  which  can  never  go  down  with  any  one  that 
duly  considers  the  matter  :  for  it  is  not  to  be  doubted,  but 
that  the  Sanballat  who  is  said,  in  the  last  chapter  of  Nehe- 
hemiah  to  have  married  his  daughter  to  one  of  the  sons  of 
Joiada  the  high-priest,  is  the  same  Sanballat  who  is  mention- 
ed so  often  in  the  former  part  of  that  book,  as  the  great  op- 
poser  of  Nehemiah  in  all  his  undertakings  for  the  welfare  of 
the  children  of  Israel :  for  he  is  in  this  place,  called  by  the 
same  proper  name  of  Sanballat,  as  in  the  former  places  of 
that  book,*^  and  hath  there  also  given  unto  him  the  same  ad- 
diti'inal  name  of  the  Horonite,  taken  from  the  name  of 
Horonaim,*^  a  city  of  Moab  (whereof  it  is  supposed  he  was 
a  native.)  And  it  is  not  likely,  that  both  these  names  sliould 
concur  in  any  other  within  the  time  of  the  same  governor 
of  Judea,  but  in  the  same  person  only.  And  that  this  same 
Sanballat  the  Horonite,  is  the  same  Sanballat  which  Jose- 
phus  treateth  of,  is  as  evident ;  for  the  Sanballat  of  Nehe- 
miah*^  was  governor  of  Samaria,  and  so  was  the  Sanballat  of 
Josephus  ;^  the  Sanballat  of  Nehemiah  was  a  great  enemy 
of  the  Jews;*^  and  so  was  the  Sanballat  of  Josephus:'  the 
Sanballat  of  Nehemiah  married  his  daughter  to  one  of  the 
sons  of  an  high-priest  of  the  Jews ;  and  so  did  the  Sanbal- 
lat of  Josephus  -^  and  who  then  is  there,  that  will  not  from 
hence  conclude  that  they  were  both  the  same  person? 

And  thus  far  I  have  shown,  that  neither  part  of  the  objec- 
tion above  mentioned  is  removed  by  either  of  these  answers. 
And  I  have  been  the  longer  herein,  because  they  have  been 
men  of  great  name,  and  great  learning,  who  have  been  the 
authors  of  them,  and  others  as  great  have  acquiesced  in  them 
as  sufficient.  But  to  come  to  the  truth  of  the  matter,  I 
answer, 

1st.  As  to  the  age  of  Nehemiah,  that  the  text  from  whence 
this  objection  is  made,  doth  not  infer  it.  For,  notwithstanding 
what  is  said  therein.  Nehemiah  might  have  been  dead,  as  no 
doubt  he  was,  a  great  number  of  years  before  it  was  written  ; 
for  all  that  is  contained  in  the  said  twelfth  chapter  of  Nehe- 
miah, from  the  beginning  of  it  to  the  twenty-seventh  verse 
of  the  same,  was  never  written  by  Nehemiah,  but  is  an  inter- 
polation there  inserted  long  after  his  death,  by  those  who 
received  this  book  into  the  canon  of  Scripture;  for  as  Ezra, 
as  far  as  he  went  in  that  collection  which  he  made  of  the 
holy  Scriptures,  inserted  in  several  places  such  interpolations 
as  he  thought  necessary  for  the  clearer  understanding  of 

d  Neb.  xiii.  28.  e  Isa.  xv.  5.    Jer.  xlviii.  3, 5, 34. 

f  Neh.  iv.  12.  g  Neh.  ii ;  iv.  6. 

h  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  "7,  8.  i  Josephus,  ibid, 
k  Neb.  xiii.  28. 


BOOK  v.]       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.        403 

them  ;^  so  they  who  laboured  after  him  in  the  perfecting  of 
the  said  collection,  did  the  same  in  the  books  which  they 
afterward  added  to  it,  till  they  had  completed  the  whole 
about  the  time  of  Cimon  the  Just :  for  he  being  the  last  of 
those  whose  labours  were  employed  in  the  settling  of  the 
canon  of  the  Scriptures  of  the  Old  Testament,  and  this  book 
being  the  last  that  was  received  into  it,  as  being  the  last  that 
was  written,  it  is  justly  reckoned  to  have  been  in  his  time 
that  it  was  first  thus  received  into  the  number  of  the  sacred 
books ;  and  then  this  interpolation  was  added  by  him,  and 
those  who  were  assisting  to  him  in  this  work.  Of  all  which 
particulars  a  fuller  account  will  be  hereafter  given  in  their 
proper  places.  And  that  this  is  an  interpolation,  the  inter- 
ruption which  is  made  thereby  in  the  sense  and  connexion 
of  that  part  of  the  book  doth  sufticiently  show  ;  and  most 
learned  men  that  have  considered  this  matter  are  now  con- 
vinced that  it  is  so.*" 

But,  2dly.  As  to  the  other  objection  which  is  drawn 
from  the  age  of  Sanballat,  the  answer  is  much  easier;  for 
here  there  is  no  opposition  between  Scripture  and  Scripture, 
but  only  between  Scripture  and  the  writings  of  a  profane 
author.  Nehemiah  placeth  Sanballat  the  Horonite  in  the 
time  of  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  ;  Josephus  makes  him  live 
down  to  the  time  of  Alexander  the  Great,  above  one  hun- 
dred years  after. °  Here  there  is  no  necessity  of  reconciling 
one  with  the  other;  for  if  both  cannot  consist  together  (as 
the  great  age  which  Sanballat  in  this  case  must  have  lived  to 
doth  sufficiently  prove  they  cannot,)  the  profane  writer  must 
give  place  to  the  sacred;  and  therefore  the  true  answer  in 
this  matter  is,  Josephus  was  mistaken.  The  sacred  writ,  as 
being  dictated  by  the  Holy  Spirit  of  God,  must  ever  be  of 
infallible  truth  ;  which  cannot  be  said  of  the  writings  of  Jose- 
phus ;  for  they  have  in  them  many  great  and  manifest  mis- 
takes ;  and  no  part  of  them  more  than  the  eleventh  book  of 
the  Antiquities,  in  which  is  written  what  gives  the  ground  for 
this  objection  ;  for  therein  he  frequently  varies  from  Scrip- 
ture, history,  and  common  sense  ;  which  manifestly  proves 
it  to  have  been  the  least  considered,  and  the  worst  digested 
of  all  that  he  hath  written.  Therein  he  makes  Cambyses," 
who  was  the  first  that  reigned  after  Cyrus,  to  have  been  the 
Persian  king  that,  by  his  decree,  forbade  the  going  on  with 
the  rebuilding  of  the  temple;  whereas  the  ScriptureP  plain- 

1  See  below  iii  (lie  sequel  of  this  history. 

m  Isaacus  Vossius  in  Chronologia  sacra,  c.  10,  p.  149.    Carey's  Chronolo- 
gy, part  2r,  book  2,  ch.  6,  p.  197. 

n  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  8.  o  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.3. 

p  Ezra  iv.  6, 7.     For  there  he  makes  Ahasuerus  to  be  the  first  after  Cyrus, 


404  CONNEXION  or  '-the  'ui&xory  of  [part  1, 

ly  tells  us  it  was  Artaxerxes  who  is  there  named  in  the  third 
place  after  Cyrus.  He  inserts  into  this  book,  out  of  the 
apocryphal  Esdras,  the  fabulous  and  absurd  story  of  the 
three  chamberlains  contending  before  Darius  Hystaspes 
about  who  was  strongest;  and  making  Zerubbabel  to  be  one 
of  them,  and  to  obtain  the  victory  in  this  contest. ^  He  in- 
troduceth  Darius  giving  him,  for  the  reward  of  this  victory, 
a  decree  for  another  return  of  the  captive  Israelites  to  Ju- 
dea  ;  which  is  neither  spoken  of  in  Scripture,  nor  consisting 
with  it  ;  and  placeth  at  the  head  of  those  who  he  saith  then 
returned,  Zerubbabel  the  governor,  and  Jeshua  the  high- 
priest  ;  whereas  it  is  certain,  from  Ezra,  Haggai,  and  Zccha- 
riah,  that  they  were  then  both  at  Jerusalem,  and  there,  on 
the  exhortations  of  the  two  prophets  last  mentioned,  setting 
forward  the  rebuilding  of  the  temple.  And  then  he  goes  on 
out  of  the  same  romance,  to  relate  as  consequential  to  this 
second  return,  (which  is  wholly  fictitious)  all  that  which  the 
Scriptures  tell  us  was  done  after  the  first ;  and  in  some  par- 
ticulars very  much  exceed  the  fictions  of  the  romancer  him- 
self; for  he  makes  those  who  came  from  Babylon  to  Judea, 
in  this  fictitious  return,  to  be  four  millions  eight  thousand 
six  hundred  and  eighty-four  men,  a  monstrous  number  !  and 
the  women  and  children  that  belonged  to  them  to  be  no 
more  than  forty  thousand  seven  hundred  and  forty-two,  a 
disproportion  which  is  utterly  incredible,  especially  among 
those  who  had  plurality  of  wives.  And  he  makes  Xerxes, 
who  succeeded  Darius  Hystaspes,  to  have  been  that 
Artaxerxes  of  the  holy  Scriptures  who  sent  Ezra  and 
Nehemiah  to  Jerusalem  ;*■  whereas  the  thirty-second  year 
of  that  Artaxerxes  is  mentioned  in  Scripture  ;^  and  it  is  cer- 
tain the  reign  of  Xerxes  did  not  exceed  twenty-one  years.^ 
He  brings  not  Nehemiah  to  Jerusalem  till  the  twenty-fifth 
year  of  that  Artaxerxes  ;'^  whereas  the  Scriptures  tell  us,  he 
came  thither  in  the  twentieth  ;^  and  he  makes  him  to  be  em- 
ployed there  three  years  and  an  half  in  the  rebuilding  of  the 
walls  of  the  city  ;  whereas  we  read  in  the  sacred  text,  that 
it  was  done  in  fifty-two  days.>  And  since  Joscphus  hath  in 
this  book  made  all  these  mistakes,  besides  many  more,  which 
it  would  be  too  long  to  relate,  I  hope  it  will  not  be  thought 
strange,  that  I  assert  what  he  saith  in  this  same  book,  in  re- 
ference to  Sanballat,  is  a  mistake  also  :  for  therein  he  tells 
us  of  him,^  '  That,  being  made  governor  of  Samaria  for  the 

and  Artaxerxes,  who  forbade  the  going  on  with  the  rebuilding  of  the  temple 
and  city  of  Jerusalem,  to  be  the  second. 

q  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  4.  r  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  5. 

s  Neh.  xiii.  6.  t  Canon  Ptolemjei. 

u  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  5.  x  Neh.  ii.  1. 

y  Neb.  vi.  lo.  r.  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  7.  8. 


BOOK  v.]      THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  405 

last  Darius,  he  married  his  daughter  to  one  whose  father 
had  been  high-priest  of  the  Jews  ;  and  that  this  son-in-law 
having,  for  this  marriage,  as  being  contrary  to  the  Jewish 
law,  been  deprived  of  his  priesthood,  and  driven  out  of  Je- 
rusalem, he  obtained  from  Alexander  (to  whom  he  revolted 
while  at  the  siege  of  T}  re,)  license  to  build  on  Mount  Geri- 
zim,  near  Samaria,  a  temple  likG  that  at  Jerusalem,  and  to 
make  his  son-in-law  high-priest  of  it;  and  that,  after  having 
attended  Alexander  at  this  siege  of  Tyre,  and  also  at  ihat 
of  Gaza  with  ei^ht  thousand  men,  about  the  time  of  the 
taking  of  the  last  of  those,  he  died.'  Thus  far  this  historian. 
That  Sanballat  thus  married  his  daughter  to  a  son  of  an 
high-priest  of  the  Jews,  and  built  a  temple  on  Mount  Geri- 
zim  for  him,  1  readily  acknowledge;  but  that  he  built  this 
temple  by  license  from  Alexander,  or  lived  down  to  those 
times,  is  a  great  mistake  in  the  relater  as  any  that  1  have 
above  mentioned  :  that  he  should  build  this  temple  by  license 
from  Alexander,  is  inconsistent  with  what  Josephus  himself 
tells  us  of  the  matter;  for,  according  to  him,  Sanballat  did 
not  revolt  to  Alexander  till  he  was  set  down  before  Tyre; 
and  that  siege  and  the  siege  of  Gaza  both  together  lasted 
only  nine  months.  And  therefore,  if  we  suppose  Sanballat 
to  have  obtained  this  license  from  Alexander  in  the  very  be- 
ginning of  these  nine  months,  he  could  have  had  but  nine 
months,  wherein  to  build  a  temple  like  that  at  Jerusalem, 
which  cost  the  labour  of  many  years,  and  the  work  of  a 
multitude  of  hands  to  erect  it.  And  how  is  it  possible  such 
a  structure  could  be  built  in  so  short  a  time,  and  that  espe- 
cially since  ail  that  vvhile  neither  Sanballat  himself  could  be 
present  to  attend  it,  nor  tho-p  by  whose  hands  and  help  the 
work  was  to  be  effected  ?  Fordur]n<j  al'  ♦^h^t  time.  Josephus 
tells  us,  Sanballat  attended  Alexatider  in  the  cainp.  a;id  had 
eight  thousand  of  his  Samaritans  there  with  him,  who  being 
the  main  strength  and  flower  of  that  people,  it  is  wholly  im- 
probable that,  in  their  absence,  those  wbo  were  left  behind 
should  have  capacity  enough  to  undertake,  or  hands  enough 
to  go  through  with  such  a  work,  especially  when  the  chief 
projector,  Sanballat  himself,  by  whose  direction  all  was  to 
be  done,  was  absent  also.  It  being  therefore  utterly  impro- 
bable, if  not  altogether  impossible,  that  this  temple  could 
have  been  built  by  a  license  from  Alexander,  in  the  lifetime 
of  Sanballat.  it  must  follov/,  that,  if  it  were  built  at  all  by 
virtue  of  such  a  license  from  Alexander,  it  must  have  been 
built  by  the  Samaritans  after  Sanballat  was  dead.  But  the 
ill  circumstances  on  which  the  Samaritans  were  with  Alex- 
ander immediately  after  the  time  when  Josephus  saith  San- 
ballat died,  and  the  great  misfortunes  which  they  thereon 
fell  into,  make  this  as  improbable  as  the  former  :  for  Alexan- 


406  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART  I. 

tier  was  no  sooner  gone  into  Egypt,  where  he  immediately 
marched  after  his  taking  of  Gaza,  but  the  J^amaritans,*  rising 
in  a  mutiny  against  Andromachus,  a  favourite  of  his,  whom 
he  had  left  governor  of  Syria,  set  tire  to  the  house  where  he 
was,  and  burned  him  to  death;  which  justly  provoked  Alex- 
ander to  so  severe  a  revenge  against  them,  that,  on  his  re- 
turn, he  put  a  great  number  of  them  to  death,  expelled  all  the 
rest  of  them  out  of  their  city,  and  gave  it  to  be  inhabited 
by  a  colony  of  his  Macedonians,  and  added  their  country  to 
that  of  the  Jews.*'  And  as  to  the  eight  thousand  men  which 
had  followed  his  camp,*^  he  sent  them  into  Thebais,  the  re- 
motest province  of  Egypt,  and  there  settled  them  on  such 
lands  as  he  caused  to  be  distributed  among  them  in  that  pro- 
vince, without  suffering  them  any  more  to  return  into  their 
own  country.  The  remainder  that  survived  this  ruin  were 
permitted  to  dwell  in  Sechem,  a  small  village  near  Samaria, 
which  hath  from  that  time  been  the  head  seat  of  that  people  ; 
and  there  they  have  remained  ever  since,  even  unto  this  day. 
And  whether  a  people,  who  had  in  so  high  a  degree  provoked 
Alexander,  should  be  allowed  to  build  such  a  temple  by  his 
favour,  or,  if  they  had,  could  be  at  all  in  a  capacity,  when 
thus  broken  and  ruined,  to  accomplish  it,  is  an  easy  question 
to  answer.  Whoever  shall  consider  this  in  both  its  branches, 
will,  no  doubt,  think  it  in  each  of  them  improbable  ;  and 
that,  with  a  license  from  Alexander,  neither  before  the  death 
of  Sanballat,  nor  after  it,  could  any  such  temple  have  been 
built  by  the  Samaritans.  However,  I  deny  not,  but  that,  as 
hath  been  already  said,  such  a  temple  was  built  l)y  Sanballat 
upon  mount  Gerizim,  and  upon  the  occasion  mentioned,  that 
is,  of  the  marriage  of  his  daughter  with  a  son  of  the  high- 
priest  of  the  Jews.  But  this  was  done  long  before  the  time 
of  the  last  Darius,  who  was  called  Codomannus,  in  the  time 
of  a  former  Darius,  surnamed  Nothus,  who  was  king  of  Per- 
sia eighty-eight  years  before  him;  forit  appearsfromScripture, 
that  this  marriage  was  consummated*^  wliile  Joiada  the  son  of 
Eliashibwashigh-priestof  the  Jews,  and  he  entered  on  his  office 
in  the  eleventh  year  of  this  Darius  ;  and  four  years  afterward, 
(that  is,  in  the  tifth  year  of  the  hi-ih-priesthood  of  the  said 
Joiada,  and  in  the  fifteenth  year  of  Darius  Nothus,)  was  it, 
that  his  son  was  thus  married  to  the  daughter  of  Sanballat ; 
as  will  be  hereafter  shown  in  its  proper  place.  And  upon 
this  marriage  followed  all  the  rest  which  Josephus  relates  of 
the  building  of  the  temple  upon  Mount  Gerizim  by  Sanbal- 
lat, and  the  making  of  his  son-in-law   high-priest  of  it.     So 

a  Eusebii  Clironicon  ad  annum  1685.     In  Lat.  Hieronymi,  p.  137.  in  Grs- 
cis,  p.  56,  177.  edit.  ult.     Q.  Curtius,  lib.  4,  c.  8. 
b  Josephus  contra  Apionem,  lib.  2)  p.  1063. 
c  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  8.  '  d  Neh.  xiii.28. 


BOOK  v.]      THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  407 

that  all  this  was  done,  not  in  the  time  of  Darius  Codomannus 
in  the  last  year  of  his  reign,  or  by  licence  from  Alexander, 
but  in  the  time  of  Darius  Nothus,  and  by  license  from  him 
only,  granted  in  the  fifteenth  year  of  his  reign,  to  Sanballat 
for  this  purpose.  And  this  clears  the  whole  objection;  for 
Darius  Nothus,  in  Ptolemy's  canon,  immediately  succeeded 
Artaxerxes  Longimarms,  in  whose  twentieth  year  Sanballat  is 
first  made  mention  of;  and  supposing  him  then  to  have  been 
thirty-five  years  old,  he  would,  in  the  fifteenth  year  of  Darius 
Nothus,  be  no  more  than  seventy-one  ;  which  is  an  age  that 
more  than  the  tenth  part  of  mankind  commonly  arrive  unto,  if 
we  may  make  a  Judgment  hereof  from  the  bills  of  mortality  in 
London,  where  commonly  the  aged  make  a  tenth  part  of  the 
burials  ;  and  none  that  die  there  use  to  be  put  into  those  bills, 
under  that  title,  unless  they  outlive  seventy.  That  which  led 
Josephus  into  thiserror,  1  take  it,  was  the  common  notion  which 
hath  long  obtained  among  his  countrymen,®  that  the  Darius 
whom  Alexander  conquered  was  the  son  of  Abasuerus  by  Es- 
ther ;  and  therefore,  on  his  making  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  to 
be  Ahasuerus,he  makes  the  Dariusthat  succeeded  him, that  is, 
Darius  Nothus,  to  be  the  last  Darius  who  was  subdued  by 
that  conqueror.  And  that  this  was  his  opinion  appears  plain- 
ly from  his  history  ;  for,  having  therein  given  us  an  account 
of  all  the  kings  of  Persia,  from  Cyrus  to  Artaxerxes  Longi- 
manus, in  that  exact  series  of  succession  in  which  they  reign- 
ed one  after  the  other,  without  omitting  so  much  as  the  Ma- 
gian  usurper,  though  he  reigned  only  seven  months,  after 
Artaxerxes  Longimanus  he  names  none  other  but  that  last 
Darius,  in  whom  the  Persian  empire  ended  ;  which  is  a  plain 
argument,  that  he  took  that  last  Darius  to  have  been  the 
Darius  that  succeeded  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  ;  and,  if  so, 
the  age  of  Sanballat  will  then  put  no  difficulty  upon  us. 
But  Isaac  Vossius,*^  by  an  emendation  of  the  text  of  Josephus, 
introduceth  thereinto  another  Artaxerxes,  as  mentioned  by 
him  to  reign  in  Persia  between  Artaxerxes  Longimanus  and 
the  last  Darius  :  for  whereas,  in  the  seventh  chapter  of  the 
eleventh  book  of  his  Antiquities,  in  all  the  printed  copies, 
we  read  of  Bagoses,  that  he  was  general  t«  a^s  'Afr«|e'f|fe, 
that  is,  of  the  people  of  Artaxerxes  ;  he  would  have  It  to  be 
rS  «APi« 'A^Ts4|e^|»,  which  may  be  rendered  in  English,  either 
of  the  other  Artaxerxes,  or  of  another  Artaxerxes ;  and,  to 
justify  the  emendation,  he  brings  t'he  authority  of  Ruffinus, 
who,  in  his  aversion  of  Josephus,  translates  this  place  as  if 
the  copy  which  he  used  had  it  t««aa«'a^t«|£^|«.  ButRuffinus's 
Latin  version  is  no  sufficient  standard  whereby  to  judge  of 

e  R.  Abraham  Levita  in  Historlca  Cabala.    David  Gantz  in  Zamach  David 
\braham  Zacutus  in  Juchasin,  &c. 
f  In  Chronologia  Sacra,  c  10,  p,  150. 


408  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

the  original,  since  in  many  places  he  fantastically  varies  from 
it.  And  since  there  were  two  Artaxerxeses  that  reigned  in 
Persia  after  Artaxerxes  Longimanus,  that  is,  Artaxerxes 
Mnemon  and  Artaxerxes  Ochus,  whether  by  this  a/Ao; 
'AfT«|£'f|};5  we  understand  the  other  Artaxerxes,  or  another  Ar- 
taxerxes, the  propriety  of  speech  will  bear  neither  of  them 
in  that  place  ;  and,  if  it  could  be,  a  long  received  reading 
ought  in  no  ancient  author  to  be  varied  from,  without  the 
authority  of  some  good  manuscript  to  justify  the  emendation  ; 
and  there  is  none  alleged  in  this  case.  So  that  all  that  Vos- 
sius  saith  about  it  can  amount  to  no  more  than  a  conjecture, 
which  we  can  build  nothing  certain  upon  :  and  to  alter  old 
authors  upon  conjecture  only  is  never  to  be  allowed,  espe- 
cially where  the  context  will  bear  the  one  reading  as  well 
as  the  other;  for,  since  the  various  fancies  of  men  may  lead 
to  various  conjectures,  if  there  should  be  such  a  liberty  al- 
lowed, whole  books  may  be  thus  altered  away  and  utterly 
defaced,  by  such  conjectural  emendations  ;  and  many  good 
authors  have  already  too  much  suffered  by  it. 

And  thus  far  I  have  explained  this  important  prophecy  in 
all  its  parts  and  branches,  and  fully  shown  all  those  events  in 
which  every  particular  of  it  had  its  completion.  That  there 
are  several  difficulties  in  it  must  be  acknowledged.  The  per- 
plexities which  many  learned  men  have  been  led  into  in  their 
explications  of  it  do  sufficienti}  prove  it ;  and  the  understand- 
ing in  a  literal  sense  what  is  there  meant  in  a  figurative  hath  not 
been  the  least  cause  hereof.  Not  to  be  delivered  in  plain  terms 
is  what  is  common  to  all  prophecies,  there  being  none  of  them 
without  their  difficulties  and  obscurities.  There  is  too  great 
an  itch  in  mankind  to  look  into  futurities,  which  belong  to 
God  only  to  know.  And,  although  God  hath  been  pleased 
so  far  to  gratify  our  curiosity  herein,  as  to  give  us  prophecies 
for  the  magnifying  of  his  omniscience  among  us  ;  yet  they 
are  most  of  them  delivered  in  such  dark  and  obscure  terms, 
as  not  to  be  thoroughly  understood  till  after  they  are  fulfilled. 
Then  the  events  become  sure  comments  upon  the  text.  And 
I  hope,  when  the  reader  hath  fully  considered  all  that  is 
above  proposed  concerning  this  very  important  prophecy, 
he  will  be  thoroughly  satisfied  how  every  particular  of  it  hath 
had  its  completion. 

But,  to  return  again  to  our  history,  Ezra'  having  found,  in 

the  second  year  of  his  gorernment,  that  many  of  the 
Ariax.\'  people  had  taken  strange  wives,  contrary  to  the  law, 

and  that  several  of  the  priests  and  Levites,  as  well  as 
other  chief  men  of  Judah  and  Benjamin,  had  transgressed 
herein,  after  he  had,  in  fasting  and  prayer,  deprecated  God's 

K  Ezra  is.  x 


StOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  SEW  TE3TAMBN3'<J.  40^ 

wrath  for  it,  he  caused  proclamation  to  be  made  for  all  the 
people  of  Israel  that  had  returned  from  the  captivity,  to 
gather  themselves  together  at  Jerusalem,  under  the  penalty 
of  excommunication  and  forfeiture  of  all  their  goods  ;  and, 
when  they  were  met,  he  made  them  sensible  of  their  sin, 
and  engaged  them  in  a  promise  and  covenant  before  God, 
to  depart  from  it,  by  putting  away  their  strange  wives, 
and  all  such  as  were  born  of  them,  that  the  seed  of  Israel 
might  not  be  polluted  with  such  an  undue  commixture  ;  and 
thereon  commissioners  were  appointed  to  inquire  into  this 
matter,  and  cause  every  man  to  do  according  to  the  law  here- 
in. And  they  set  down  the  first  day  of  the  tenth  month  to 
examine  hereinto,  and  made  an  end  by  the  first  day  of  the  first 
month  ;  so  that,  in  three  months  time,  that  is,  in  the  tenth, 
eleventh,  and  twelfth  months  of  the  Jewish  year,  a  thorough 
reformation  was  made  of  this  transgression  ;  which  three 
months  answer  to  January,  February,  and  March,  in  our 
year. 

About  this  time,''  Bigthan  and  Teresh,  two  eunuchs  of  the 
palace,  entered  into  a  conspiracy  against  the  life  of  king  Ar- 
taxerxes.  Most  likely  they  were  of  those  who  had  attended 
queen  Vashti ;  and,  being  now  out  of  their  offices  by  the 
degrading  of  their  mistress,  and  the  advancing  of  another  into 
her  place,  took  that  disgust  thereat,  as  to  resolve  to  revenge 
themselves  on  the  king  for  it ;  of  which  Mordecai  having 
gotten  the  knowledge,  he  made  discovery  hereof  to  queen 
Esther,  and  she,  in  Mordecai's  name  to  the  king;  whereon 
inquiry  being  made  into  the  matter,  and  the  whole  treason 
laid  open  and  discovered,  the  traitors  were  both  crucified 
for  it,  and  the  history  of  the  whole  matter  was  entered  oa 
the  public  registers  and  annals  of  the  kingdom. 

Megabyzus  and  Artabazus,  who  were  appointed  generals 
by  Artaxerxes  for  the  Egyptian  war,*  had  drawn  together 
into  Cilicia  and  Phoenicia  an  army  of  three  hundred  thou- 
sand men  for  that  expedition  ;  but  wanting  a  fleet  for  the  car- 
rying of  it  on  by  sea,  they  were  forced  to  tarry  there  all  this 
year,  while  it  was  preparing  for  them  in  Cilicia,  Cyprus, 
and  Phoenicia,  and  other  maritime  parts  of  the  Persian  em- 
pire there  adjoining  ;  all  which  time  they  carefully  employ- 
ed in  exercising  their  soldiers,  and  practising  and  instructing 
them  in  all  military  arts  for  the  war  ;  which  conduced  not  a 
little  to  the  victory  which  they  afterward  obtained.  In 
the  interim,  Inarus  with  his  Egyptians  and  the  Athenian  auxi- 
liaries, pressed  hard  their  assaults  upon  the  white  wall  at 
Memphis  ;  but  the  Persians  valiantly  defending  themselves, 
the  siege  continued  all  this  year  without  any  success. 

h  Estb«r  ii.  21.  i  Clcslas.    Diod.  Sir.  hb.  11. 

Vot.  T.  55 


410  CCJ^WLXION  0¥  THK  tilaXURY   OF  [fAKT  i. 

But  the  next  year  after,'^  the   Persian  fleet  being  read)> 

Artabazus   took   the   command   of  it,  and    set   sail 
j^"a,f^;  for    the    Nile ;    and,  at    the   same  time,  Megabyzus 

marched  the  army  over  land  to  Memphis  ;  where, 
on  his  arrival,  having  raised  the  siege,  and  joined  the  be- 
sieged, he  gave  battle  to  Inarus  and  all  his  forces,  and  over- 
threw them  with  a  great  slaughter,  which  fell  chiefly  upon 
the  Egyptian  revolters.  After  this  defeat,  Inarus,  though 
wounded  in  the  fight  by  Megabyzus,  made  his  retreat  with  the 
Athenian  auxiliaries,  and  as  many  of  the  Egyptians  as  would 
follow  him,  to  Biblus,  a  city  standing  in  the  island  Proso- 
pitis  ;  which,  being  surrounded  by  the  Nile,  and  the  branches 
of  that  river  encompassing  it  being  both  navigable,  the  Athe- 
nians drew  up  their  fleet  into  one  of  them,  in  a  station  where 
it  was  safe  from  the  enemy,  and  endured  a  siege  of  a  year 
and  a  half  in  that  island.  In  the  interim,  the  rest  of  the 
Egyptians,  after  that  blow,  all  submitted  to  the  conquerors, 
and  returned  again  to  their  obedience  to  king  Artaxerxes,  ex- 
cepting Amyrtaeus,  who  still  maintained  a  party  against  them 
in  the  fens,  where  he  reigned  many  years  ;  the  Persians,  by 
reason  of  the  difliculty  of  access  to  those  parts,  having  been 
never  able  to  reduce  him. 

In  the  mean  time,  the  Persian  army  at  Prosopitis  pressed 

on  the  siege  ;'  but  finding  that  they  could  make  no 
Aiuisf'u.  work  of  it  by  the  usual   and  common  ways  of  war, 

by  reason  of  the  valour  and  resolution  of  the  defend- 
ants, at  length  had  recourse  to  craft  and  stratagem,  whereby 
they  soon  accomplished  what  by  open  force  they  could  not 
effect;  for  having,  by  the  making  of  many  channels,  drained 
that  branch  of  the  Nile  in  which  the  Athenian  fleet  had  its 
station,  they  laid  it  on  dry  ground,  and  made  a  passage  open 
for  all  their  army  to  pass  over  into  the  island ;  whereon  Inarus, 
seeing  his  case  desperate,  with  all  his  Egyptians,  and  about 
fifty  of  the  Athenian  auxiliaries,  came  to  composition  with 
Megabyzus,  and  yielded  to  him  on  terms  of  safety  for  their 
lives.  But  the  rest  of  the  auxiliaries,  being  in  number  about 
six  thousand,  put  themselves  on  their  defence  ;  and  therefore, 
having  set  their  fleet  on  fire,  stood  together  in  battle  array, 
with  resolution  to  die  with  their  swords  in  their  hands,  and,  in 
imitation  of  the  Lacedaemonians  that  fell  at  Thermopylas, 
sell  their  lives  as  dear  as  they  could  ;  which  the  Persians  per- 
ceiving, and  not  being  willing  to  engage  with  men  so  despe- 
rately resolved,  offered  them  peace  on  terms,  that  they  should 
leave  Egypt,  and  have  a  free  passage  home  into  their  own 
country  which  way  they  should  choose  for  their  return  thi- 

k  ThucydWes,  Ul>.  1.    Ctesia!.    BiodOr.  Sic.  lib.  11. 
1  DjU: 


BOOK  V.'J  THE  OLD  AND  NEVf  TESTAMENTS,  411 

ther;  which  being  accepted  of,  they  delivered  the  island,  with 
the  city  of  Biblus,  to  the  conquerors,  and  marched  to  Gy- 
rene, where  they  took  shipping  for  Greece.  But  the  major 
part  of  those  that  went  on  this  expedition  perished  in  it. 

And  this  was  not  all  the  loss  which  the  Athenians  suffered 
in  this  war  :■"  for  another  fleet  of  fifty  sail  being  sent  by  them 
for  the  relief  of  those  who  were  besieged  in  Prosopitis,  they 
arrived  at  one  of  the  mouths  of  the  Nile,  a  little  after  the 
place  was  delivered,  with  intention  to  sail  up  the  Nile,  for 
the  assistance  of  their  countrymen,  to  the  place  where  they 
were  besieged,  not  knowing  the  misfortune  that  had  happen- 
ed to  them.  But  they  were  no  sooner  entered  the  river,  but 
they  were  set  upon  by  the  Persian  fleet  from  the  sea,  and 
assaulted  with  darts  by  their  land  army  from  the  shore  ;  so 
that  they  all  perished,  excepting  a  very  few  of  their  ships, 
which  broke  through  the  enemjt  and  escaped.  And  here 
ended  this  unfortunate  war,  which  the  Athenians  made  in 
Egypt,  in  the  sixth  year  after  it  was  begun.  And,  after  this, 
Egypt  was  again  reduced  under  the  Persian  yoke,  and  so 
continued  all  the  remaining  time  of  the  reign  of  Artaxerxes. 

Joachim,  the  high-priest  of  the  Jews,  being  dead, 
was   succeeded  by  Eliashib  his  son,"  who  bore  that  Amjr.^il 
office  forty  years. 

Haman,  an  Amaiekite  of  the  posterity  of  Agag,  who  was 
king  of  Amalek  in  the  time  of  Saul,"  growing  to  be  the  chief 
favourite  of  king  Artaxerxes,  all  the  king's  servants  were 
commanded  to  pay  reverence  untd  him,  and  bow  before  him ; 
and  all  of  them  obeyed  the  royal  order  herein,  excepting 
Mordecai  the  Jew,  who,  sitting  in  the  king's  gate  according 
to  his  office,  paid  not  any  reverence  to  Haman  at  such  times 
as  he  passed  by  into  the  palace,  neither  bowed  he  at  all  to 
him  :  of  which  being  told,  he  was  exceeding  wroth  ;  but  scorn- 
ing to  lay  hands  on  one  man  only,  and  being  informed  that  he 
was  a  Jew,  he  resolved  in  revenge  of  this  affront,  to  de 
stroy  not  only  him,  but  also  his  whole  nation  with  him  ;  and  to 
this  perchance  he  was  not  a  little  excited  by  the  ancient  en- 
mity which  was  between  them  and  the  people  of  whom  he 
was  descended.  And,  therefore,  for  the  accomplishing  of 
this  design,  on  the  first  day  of  the  first  month,  that  is,  the  month 
Nisan,  he  called  together  his  diviners,  to  find  out  what  dav 
would  be  the  most  lucky  for  the  putting  of  it  in  execution  ; 
whereon  they  having,  according  to  the  way  of  divination  then 
in  use  among  those  eastern  people,  cast  lots,  first  upon  each 
month,  and  after  upon  each  day  of  the  month,  did  thereby 

mThucydides,  lib.  1. 

n  Chronicon  Alexandrin.     Nek.  xii.  10.    Joseph.  Antiq.  lib.  11.  c.  a. 
o  E"s(her  iii. 


412  CONNEXION  OF  THE  RlSTORr  OF  [pART  1. 

• 

determine  for  Ihe  thirteenth  day  of  the  twelfth  month  follow- 
ing, called  Adar,  as  the  day  which  they  judged  would  be  the 
most  lucky  for  the  accomplishing  of  what  he  purposed  : 
whereon  he  forthwith  went  in  unto  the  king,  and  having  in- 
sinuated to  him  that  there  was  a  certain  people,  dispersed  all 
over  his  empire,  who  did  not  keep  the  king's  laws,  but  fol- 
lowed laws  of  their  own,  diverse  from  the  laws  of  all  other 
people,  to  the  disturbance  of  the  good  order  of  his  kingdom, 
and  the  breach  of  that  uniformity  whereby  it  ought  to  be 
governed  5  and  that  therefore  it  was  not  for  the  king's  profit 
that  they  should  be  any  longer  suffered  ;  he  proposed  and 
gave  counsel  that  they  should  be  all  destroyed,  and  extirpated 
out  of  the  whole  empire  of  Persia,  and  urged  it  as  that  which 
was  necessary  for  the  establishing  of  the  peace  and  good  order 
of  his  government.  To  which  having  obtained  the  king's 
consent,  and  an  order,  that  on  the  thirteenth  day  of  Adar 
following,  according  as  was  determined  by  the  divination  of 
the  lots,  it  should  be  put  in  execution,  he  called  the  king's 
scribes  together  to  write  the  decree  :  and  it  being  drawn  ac- 
cording as  he  proposed,  on  the  thirteenth  day  of  the  same 
month  of  Nisan,  copies  thereof  were  written  out  and  sentln- 
To  all  the  provinces  of  the  empire,  commanding  the  king's 
lieutenants,  governors,  and  all  other  his  officers  in  every  one 
of  them  to  destroy,  kill,  or  cause  to  perish,  all  Jews,  both 
young  and  old,  little  clildren  and  women,  in  one  day,  even 
on  the  thirteenth  day  of  Adar  following,  and  to  take  the  spoil 
of  them  for  a  prey  :  which  day  being  full  eleven  months 
after  the  date  of  the  decree,  the  lot  which  pointed  out  that 
day  seems  to  have  been  directed  by  the  special  providence 
of  God,  that,  so  long  a  space  intervening,  there  might  be  time 
enough  to  take  such  measures  as  might  be  proper  to  prevent 
the  mischief  intended. 

But  an  objection  being  like  to  arise  against  this,  from 
those  who  had  the  management  of  the  king's  treasury,  be- 
cause the  destroying  of  so  great  a  number  of  the  king's  sub- 
jects, as  the  Jews  through  the  whole  empire  amounted  to, 
must  necessarily  caase  a  great  diminution  of  the  public  taxes, 
he  offered  ten  thousand  taler.ts  of  silver  out  of  his  own 
purse  to  make  the  king  amends  for  it ;°  which  sum,  if  com- 
puted by  Babylonish  talents,  amounts  to  two  millions  one 
hundred  and  nineteen  thousand  pounds  of  our  sterling 
money;  but  if  by  Jewish  talents,  it  will  be  above  twice 
as  much  ;  a  prodigious  sum  for  a  private  man  to  be  owner 
of!  As  this  shows  the  greatness  of  his  riches,  so  doth  it 
also  the  greatness  of  his  malice  towards  the  Jew?,  that  he 


«0OK  v.]  THE  OLD  AKD  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  413 

could  be  content  to  give  so  great  a  price  for  the  executing  of 
his  revenge  upon  them.  But  the  king's  favour  was  then  so 
great  toward  him,  that  he  remitted  to  him  all  thai  sum,  and 
granted  him  all  that  he  desired  without  it ;'!  though  the  da- 
mage which  liie  king  would  have  suffered  by  it  in  his  revenue 
•  would  have  been  much  greater  than  all  that  the  enemy  was 
able  to  give  could  have  been  sufilcient  to  countervail/  We 
are  not  to  wonder  that  private  men  had  then  such  vast  riches. 
There  are  instances  to  be  given  of  much  greater  sums  in  the 
hands  of  such  men  in  those  ancient  times.  1  shall  at  pre- 
sent mention  only  two  of  them;  Pythius  the  Lydian  and 
Marcus  Crassus  the  Roman.  The  former,^  when  Xerxes 
passed  into  Greece,  was  possessed  of  two  thousand  talents 
in  silver,  and  four  millions  of  daricsin  gold,  which,  together, 
amounted  to  near  five  millions  and  an  half  of  our  sterling 
money  ;  and  the  latter,'  after  he  had  consecrated  the  tenth  of 
all  that  he  had.  to  Hercules,  feasted  all  the  people  of  Rome 
at  ten  thousand  tables,  and  had  given  them,  in  a  donative  of 
corn  to  every  citizen,  as  much  as  would  last  him  three  months, 
found  the  remainder  of  his  estate  to  be  seven  thousand  one 
hundred  Roman  talents,  which  amounts  to  above  a  million 
and  an  half  of  our  money.  This  may  seem  much  to  us  at 
present.  But  the  wonder  will  cease,  when  we  consider 
that  from  the  time  of  David  and  Solomon,  and  for  above 
fifteen  hundred  years  afterward,  gold  and  silver  was  in  much 
greater  plenty  in  the  world  than  either  of  them  is  at  present. 
The  immense  riches  which  Solomon  had  in  gold  and  silver," 
the  prodigious  quantities  of  both  these  which  Alexander 
found  in  the  treasuries  of  Darius,^  and  the  vast  loads  of  them 
which  we  find  often  to  have  been  carried  in  triumph  before 
Roman  generals,  when  they  returned  from  conquered  pro- 
vinces,^  and  the  excessive  sums  which  some  of  the  Roman 
emperors  expended  in  their  luxurious  and  fantastical  enjoy- 
ments,^  and  in  donatives  to  their  armies,  and  many  other  in- 
stances in  the   histories  of  the  times  I  have  mentioned,  suf- 

q  Ezra  iii.  10.  r  Esther  vii.  4. 

s  Herodotus,  lib.  7.  t  Plutarch,  in  Crasso. 

u  The  gold  wherewith  he  overlaid  the  Sanctum  Sanctorum  only,  a  room 
in  the  temple  of  thirty  feet  square,  and  thirty  feet  high,  besides  what  was 
expended  on  other  parts  of  the  temple,  and  in  the  utensils  and  vessels  of  it, 
amounted  to  six  hundred  talents,  which,  reduced  to  our  money,  is  four  mil- 
lions three  hundred  and  twenty  thousand  pounds  sterling;  and  the  gold 
■which  he  had  in  one  year  from  Ophir  amounted  to  four  hundred  and  fifty 
talents,  which,  reduced  to  our  money,  is  three  millions  two  hundred  and 
forty  thousand  pounds  ;  and  his  annual  tribute  in  gold,  besides  silver,  was 
six  hundred  and  sixty-six  talents,  which  amounts  to  four  millions  seven 
hundred  and  ninety-five  thousand  two  hundred  pounds  orf  our  sterling  mo- 
ney. X  See  Diodorus  Siculus,  ArrraO,  and  Quintus  Curtms, 

y  See  the  Roman  Historiaos. 


414  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  i, 

ficiently  proves  this.^  But  at  length  the  mines  which  fur- 
nished this  plenty,  especially  those  of  the  Southern  Arabia, 
(where  we  suppose  was  the  Ophir  of  the  ancients)  being 
exhausted,  and  the  burning  of  cities,  and  great  devasta- 
tions of  countries,  which  after  followed  from  the  eruptions 
of  the  Goths,  Vandals,  Huns,  and  other  barbarous  nations, 
in  the  West,  and  of  the  Saracens,  Turks,  and  Tartars  in  the 
East,  having  wasted  and  destroyed  a  great  part  of  the  gold 
and  silver  which  the  worSd  afore  abounded  with,  this  induced 
that  great  scarcity  of  both  which  afterward  ensued,  and 
which  the  mines  of  Mexico,  Peru,  and  Brasil,  have  not  as 
yet  been  able  fully  to  repair. 

It  is  hard  to  find  a  reason  for  Mordecai's  refusing  to  pay 
this  respect  to  Haman,  which  may  be  sufficient  to  excuse 
him  for  thus  exposing  himself  and.all  his  nation  to  that  de- 
struction which  it  had  like  to  have  drawn  upon  them.  That 
which  is  commonly  said  is,  that  it  was  the  same  adoration 
which  was  paid  to  the  king  of  Persia  ;  and  that  consisting 
in  the  bowing  of  the  knee,  and  the  prostration  of  the  whole 
body  even  to  the  ground,  it  was  avoided  by  Mordecai,^  upon 
a  notion  which  he  had  of  its  being  idolatrous.''  But  this 
being  the  common  compliment  which  was  constantly  paid  to 
the  kings  of  Persia  by  all  that  were  admitted  into  their  pre- 
sence, it  was  no  doubt  paid  to  this  very  king  by  Ezra  and 
Nehemiah,  when  they  had  access  unto  him,  and  after  also  by 
Mordccai  himself;  for  otherwise  he  could  not  have  obtained 
that  admission  into  his  presence,  and  that  advancement  in  his 
palace,  which  was  afterward  there  granted  unto  him.  And  if  it 
were  not  idolatrous  to  pay  this  adoration  to  the  king,  neither 
could  it  be  idolatrous  to  pay  it  to  Haman.  The  Greeks  would 
not  pay  this  respect  to  the  king  of  Persia,  outofpride  ;  and  ex- 
cepting Themistocles,  and  two  or  three  more,'^  of  none  them 

z  One  of  these  instances  may  be  in  LucuUus,  a  Roman  senator  :  for  in  one 
of  his  halls,  which  he  called  Apollo,  he  expended  fifty  thousand  Roman  de- 
narii every  time  he  supped  there,  (which  is  near  sixteen  hundred  pounds  of 
our  money,)  and  there  he  supped  as  often  as  any  of  the  better  sort  supped 
with  liim.  The  words  of  Plutarch,  who  tells  us  this  in  the  life  of  Lucullus, 
€xpress  no  more  than  that  the  supper  cost  him  five  myriads  ;  but  this,  in 
strict  propriety  of  speech,  can  in  that  author  be  meant  of  no  other  myriads, 
but  of  denarii.  If  we  carry  the  valuation  down  to  that  of  sestertii,  five  my- 
riads (tkat  is,  fifty  thousand)  of  them  will  amount  to  a  quarter  the  sum  above 
mentioned,  that  is,  four  hundred  pounds  sterling  •,  and  this  is  prodigious 
enough  to  be  spent  in  a  supper  for  the  entertainment  of  two  Roman  sena- 
tors (for  no  more  were  present  at  the  supper  particularly  mentioned  by  that 
author,)  and  is  a  great  instance  of  the  prodigious  wealth  of  the  entertainer. 

a  Vide  Brissonium  de  Regno  Pers.  lib.  1,  sec.  16, 17, 18,  19,20. 

b  Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  1 1 ,  c.  6. 

c  One  of  these  was  Timagoras  an  Athenian,  on  whom  the  people  of  Athens 
passed  sentence  of  death  for  it,  thinking  the  honour  of  their  whole  city  de- 
based by  this  mean  submission  of  one  of  their  citizens  to  him,  that  w»'^ 
Jiven  the  greatest  king  of  the  whole  earth.     V«ler.  Mai.  lib.  6,  c.  3. 


UOOK  v.]       THE  OLD  AHV   NEW  TESTAMENTS.  4  1  .J 

couldever  be  brought  to  it.'*  Iwillnot  say  thatthiswas  the  case 
of  Mordecai  in  respect  of  Haman.  It  seems  most  probable, 
that  his  refusing  to  pay  him  this  reverence  was  from  a  cause 
that  was  personal  in  Haman  only.  Perchance  it  was  because 
Hamanbeingof  the  race  of  the  Amalekites,helookedonhimas 
underthecurse  which  God  had  denounced  against  that  nation,*^ 
and  therefore  thought  himself  obliged  not  to  give  such  honour 
unto  him.  And  if  all  the  rest  of  the  Jews  thought  the  same, 
this  might  seem  reason  enough  to  him  to  extend  his  wrath 
against  the  whole  nation,  and  to  meditate  the  destruction  of 
them  all  in  revenge  hereof.  But  whatsoever  was  the  cause 
that  induced  Mordecai  to  refuse  the  payment  of  this  respect 
to  the  king's  favourite,  this  provoked  that  favourite  to  ob- 
tain the  decree  above  mentioned,  for  the  utter  extirpation  of 
the  whole  Jewish  nation  in  revenge  for  it. 

When  Mordecai  heard  of  this  decree,  he  made  great  la- 
mentation, as  did  also  all  the  Jews  of  Shushan  with  him  ;' 
and  therefore  putting  on  sackcloth,  he  sat  in  this  mournful 
garb  without  the  king's  gate,  (for  he  might  not  enter  within 
it  in  that  dress,)  which  being  told  Esther,  she  sent  to  him  to 
know  what  the  matter  was  ;  whereon  Mordecai  acquainted 
her  with  the  whole  state  of  the  case,  and  sent  her  a  copy 
of  the  decree,  that  thereby  she  might  fully  see  the  mischief 
that  was  intended  against  her  people,  absolutely  to  destroy 
them,  and  root  them  out  from  the  face  of  the  earth ;  and 
therefore  commanded  her  forthwith  to  go  in  unto  the  king, 
and  make  supplication  for  them.  At  first  she  excused  her- 
self because  of  the  law,  whereby  it  was  ordained,  that 
whosoever,  whether  man  or  woman,  should  conrre  in  unto 
the  king  into  the  inner  court,  who  was  not  called  for,  should 
be  put  to  death,  excepting  such  only  to  whom  the  king 
should  hold  out  the  golden  sceptre  in  his  hand,  that  he 
might  live ;  and  she  was  afraid  of  hazarding  her  life  in  this 
case.  Whereon  Mordecai,  sending  to  her  again,  told  her, 
that  the  decree  extended  universally  to  all  of  her  nation 
without  any  exception  ;  and  that,  if  it  came  to  execution, 
she  must  not  expect  to  escape  more  than  any  other  of  her 
people  ;  that  Providence  seemed  to  have  advanced  her  of 
purpose  for  this  work ;  but  if  she  refused  to  act  her  part  in 
it,  then  deliverance  should  come  some  other  way,  and  she 
and  her  father's  house  should  perish  ;  for  he  was  fully  per- 
suaded God  would  not  sufTer  his  people  to  be  thus  totally- 
destroyed.     Whereon  Esther,  resolving  to  put  her  life  to 

d  Vide  Plutarchum  in  Themistocle,  &.  Pelopida  &.  Artaserxe.    Herod,  lib. 
7.    Justinum.  lib.  6,  c.  2.    Corneliunj  Nepotera  in  Conone. 
e  Exod.  xvi.  14.     1  Sam.  xv. 2,  3. 
t  Est&cr  iv.    Josephua  Antiq.  lib.  ll,c,  ?. 


416  CONNEXION    OP  THE  HISTORV    OF  [pART  5. 

hazard  for  the  safety  of  her  people,  desired  Mordecai,  that 
he  and  all  the  Jews  then  in  Shushan  would  Aist  three  days 
for  her,  and  offer  up  prayer  and  humble  supplication  to  God 
to  prosper  her  in  the  undertaking ;  which  being  accordingly 
done,  on  the  third  day,  Esther  put  on  her  royal  apparel,  and 
went  in  unto  the  king,  where  he  was  sitting  upon  his  throne 
in  the  inner  part  of  the  palace  :  and  as  soon  as  he  saw  her 
standing  in  th^  court,  he  showed  favour  unto  her,  and  held 
out  his  golden  sceptre  towards  her,  and  Esther,  going  near, 
and  touching  the  top  of  it,  had  thereby  her  life  secured  unto 
her.  And  when  the  king  asked  her  what  her  petition  was, 
at  first  she  only  desired,  that  he  and  Haman  would  come  to 
a  banquet  which  she  had  prepared  for  him.  And  when  Ha- 
man was  called,  and  the  king  and  he  were  atthe  banquet,  he 
asked  her  again  of  her  petition,  promising  it  should  be  granted 
her,  even  to  the  half  of  his  kingdom  :  but  then  she  desired 
only  that  the  king  and  Haman  would  come  again  the  next 
day  to  the  like  banquet,  intimating  that  then  she  would  make 
known  her  request  unto  him.  Her  intention,  in  desiring 
thus  to  entertain  the  king  twice  at  her  banquets,  before  she 
made  known  her  petition  unto  him,  was,  that  thereby  she 
might  the  more  endear  herself  to  him,  and  dispose  him  the 
better  to  grant  the  request  which  she  had  to  make  unto  him. 
Haman,  being  proud  of  the  honour  of  being  thus  admit- 
ted ulone  with  the  king  to  the  queen's  banquet,  went  home 
to  his  house  much  puffed  up  herewith.  But,  in  his  return- 
ing thither,  seeing  Mordecai  sitting  at  the  gate  of  the  palace, 
and  still  refusing  to  bow  unto  him,  this  moved  his  indignatiou 
to  such  a  degree,  that,  on  his  coming  to  his  house,  and  call- 
ing his  friends  about  him  to  relate  to  them  the  great  honour 
that  was  done  him  by  the  king  and  queen,  and  the  high 
advancement  which  he  had  obtained  in  the  kingdom,  he 
could  not  forbear  complaining  of  the  disrespect  and  affront 
offered  him  by  Mordecai.  Whereon  they  advised  him  to 
cause  a  gallows  to  be  built  of  fifty  cubits  height,  and  next 
morning  to  ask  the  king  to  have  Mordecai  to  be  hanged 
thereon.  And  accordingly  he  ordered  the  gallows  immedi- 
ately to  be  made,  and  went  early  next  morning  to  the  palace 
for  the  obtaining  of  a  grant  from  the  king,  to  hang  Mordecai 
on  it.  But  that  morning  the  king  awaking  sooner  than  ordi- 
nary, and  not  being  able  to  compose  himself  again  to  sleep, 
he  called  for  the  book  of  the  records  and  chronicles  of  the 
kingdom,  and  caused  them  to  be  read  unto  him  ;  wherein 
finding  an  account  of  the  conspiracy  of  Bigthan  and  Teresh, 
and  that  it  was  discovered  by  Mordecai  the  Jew,  the  kinj: 

a,  Esther  vi 


ROOK  V.J  THE  OLD  AND  NKW  TESTAMENTS.  417 

inquired  what  honour  had  been  done  to  him  for  the  same  ; 
and  being  told  tliat  nothing  had  been  done  for  him,  he  in- 
quired who  was  in  the  court;  and  being  told  that  Haman 
M'as  standing  there  (for  he  attended  early  to  speak  to  the 
king  for  the  purpose  I  have  mentioned,)  he  ordered  him  to 
be  called  in,  and  asked  of  him,  what  should  be  done  to  the 
man  whom  the  king  delighted  to  honour  ?  Whereon  Haman, 
thinking  this  honour  was  intended  for  himself,  gave  advice, 
that  the  royal  apparel  should  be  brought  which  the  king 
used  to  wear,  and  the  horse  which  was  kept  for  his  own 
riding,  and  the  crown  royal  which  useth  to  be  set  upon  his 
head,  and  that  this  apparel  and  horse  should  be  delivered 
into  the  hands  of  one  of  the  king's  most  noble  princes,  that 
he  might  array  therewith  the  man  whom  the  king  delighted 
to  honour,  and  bring  him  on  horseback  through  the  whole 
city,  and  proclaim  before  him.  Thus  shall  it  be  done  unto  the 
man  whom  the  king  delighteth  to  honour.  Whereon  the  king 
commanded  him  forthwith  to  take  the  apparel  and  horse, 
and  do  all  this  to  Mordecai  the  Jew  who  sat  in  the  king's 
gate,  in  reward  for  his  discovery  of  the  treason  of  the  two 
eunuchs."  All  which  Haman  having  been  forced  to  do  in 
obedience  to  the  king's  command,  he  returned  with  great 
sorrow  to  his  house,  lamenting  the  disappointment,  and  great 
mortification  he  had  met  with,  in  being  thus  forced  to  pay 
so  signal  an  honour  to  his  enemy,  whom  he  intended  at  the 
same  time  to  have  hanged  on  the  gallows  which  he  had  pro- 
vided for  him.  And,  on  his  relating  of  this  to  his  friends, 
they  all  told  him,  that  if  this  Mordecai  were  of  the  seed  of 
the  Jews,  this  bad  omen  foreboded  that  he  should  not  pre- 
vail against  him,  but  should  surely  fall  before  him.  While 
they  were  thus  talking,  one  of  the  queen's  chamberlains 
came  to  Hainan's  house  to  hasten  him  to  the  banquet,  and 
seeing  the  gallows  which  had  been  set  up  the  night  before, 
fully  informed  himself  of  the  intent  for  which  it  was  pre- 
pared. On  the  king  and  Haman's  sitting  down  to  the  ban- 
quet, the  king  asked  again  of  Esther,  what  was  her  petition, 
with  like  promise,  as  before,  of  granting  it  to  her  even  to 
the  half  of  his  kingdom.''  Whereon  she  humbly  prayed  the 
king,  that  her  life  might  be  given  her  at  her  petition,  and  her 
people  at  her  request;  for  a  design  was  laid  for  the  destruc- 
tion of  her,  and  all  her  kindred  and  nation ;  at  which  the 
king  asking  with  much  anger,  who  it  was  that  durst  do  this 
thing,  she  told  him  that  Haman,  then  present,  was  the  wicked 
author  of  the  plot,  and  laid  the  whole  of  it  open  to  the  king. 
Whereon  the  king  rose  up  in  great  wrath  from  the  banquet, 

g  Esther  vi. 
h  Esther  vii,    Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11.  c.  <i 
Vol.  .1,  53 


41  g  CONKEXIOX  or  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PAKT  i- 

and  walked  out  into  the  garden  adjoining;  which  Haman 
perceiving,  fell  down  before  the  queen  upon  the  bed  on 
which  she  was  sitting,  to  supplicate  for  his  life ;  in  which 
posture,  the  king  having  found  him  on  his  return,  spoke  out 
in  great  passion.  What,  will  he  force  the  queen  before  me  in 
the  house  ?  At  which  words  the  servants  present  immediate- 
ly covered  his  face,  as  was  then  the  usage  to  condemned 
persons;'  and  the  chamberlain,  who  had  that  day  called 
Haman  to  the  banquet,  acquainting  the  king  of  the  gallows 
which  he  saw  at  his  house  there  prepared  for  Mordecai, 
who  had  saved  the  king's  life  in  detecting  the  treason  of  the 
two  eunuchs,  the  king  ordered  that  he  should  be  forthwith 
hanged  thereon,  which  was  accordingly  done  ;  and  all  his 
house,  goods,  and  riches,  were  given  to  queen  Esther,  and 
she  appointed  Mordecai  to  be  her  steward  to  manage  the 
same.  On  the  same  day,  the  queen  acquainted  the  king  of 
the  relation  which  Mordecai  had  unto  her  ;  whereon  the 
king  took  him  into  his  favour,  and  advanced  him  to  great 
power,  riches,  and  dignity,  in  the  empire,  and  made  him  the 
keeper  of  his  signet  in  the  same  manner  as  Haman  had  been 
before.*^ 

But  still  the  decree  for  the  destruction  of  the  Jews 
remaining  in  its  full  force,  the  queen  petitioned  the  king  the 
second  time  to  put  away  this  mischief  from  them.'  But  ac- 
cording to  the  laws  of  the  JNIedes  and  Persians,  nothing  being 
to  be  reversed  which  had  been  decreed  and  written  in  the 
king's  name,  and  sealed  with  the  king's  seal,™  and  the  decree 
procured  by  Haman  against  the  Jews  having  been  thus 
written  and  sealed,  it  could  not  be  recalled.  All,  therefore, 
that  the  king  could  do,  in  compliance  with  her  request,  was 
to  give  the  Jews,  by  a  new  decree,  such  a  power  to  defend 
themselves  against  all  that  should  assault  them,  as  might 
render  the  former  decree  ineffectual ;  and  for  that  end  he 
bid  Esther  and  Mordecai  draw  such  a  decree  in  words,  as 
strong  as  they  could  devise,  that  so  the  former  might  be 
hindered  from  being  executed,  though  it  could  not  be  annul- 
led. And  therefore  the  king's  scribes  being  again  called,  on 
the  twenty-third  day  of  the  third  month,  a  new  decree  was 
drawn,  just  two  months  and  ten  days  after  the  former ; 
wherein  the  king  granted  to  the  Jews,  which  were  in  every 
city  of  the  Persian  empire,  full  license  to  gather  themselves 
together,  and  stand  for  their  lives  ;  and  to  destroy,  slay,  and 
cause  to  perish,  all  the  power  of  the  people  and  province 
that  should  assault  them,  witli  their  little  ones  and  women,. 

i  Vide  Brissonium  de  Regno  Persaruai.  k  Esther  viii 

1  Esther  riii.  Josephus,  lib.  11,  c.  6. 
m  Dan.  vi.  8,  15.     Esther  i.  19 :  viii,  8 


BOOK  v.]       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  419. 

and  to  take  the  spoil  of  them  for  a  prey.  And  this  decree 
being  written  in  the  king's  name,  and  sealed  with  his  seal, 
copies  hereof  were  drawn  out,  and  especial  messengers  were 
despatched  with  them  into  all  the  provinces  of  the  empire. 
In  the  interim,"  Megabyzus  having  reduced  the  whole 
kingdom  of  Egypt,  except  the  fenny  part  held  by  Amyrtasus, 
and  there  settled  all  matters  again  under  the  dominion  of 
king  Artaxerxes,  he  made  Sartamas  governor  of  that  coun- 
try, and  returned  to  Susa,  carrying  with  him  Inarus  and  his 
Grecian  prisoners.  And  having  given  the  king  an  account 
of  the  articles  he  had  granted  tliem  of  life  and  safety,  he 
obtained  of  him  a  ratification  of  the  same,  although  with 
difficulty,  because  of  the  king's  anger  against  them  for  the 
death  of  Achasmenides  his  brother,  who  was  slain  in  battle 
against  them.  But  Hamestris,  the  mother  of  both  these 
brothers,  was  so  eagerly  set  for  the  revenging  of  the  death 
of  her  son,  that  she  not  only  demanded,  that  Inarus  and  his 
Greeks  should  be  delivered  up  to  her  to  be  put  to  death  for 
it,  contrary  to  the  articles  given  them,  but  also  required  that 
Megabyzus  himself,  though  her  son-in-law,  should  undergo 
the  same  punishment,  for  granting  them  such  articles  as 
should  exempt  them  from  that  just  revenge,  which  in  this 
case  she  ought  to  execute  upon  them.  And  it  was  with 
difficulty  that  she  was  for  this  time  put  off  with  a  denial. 

The  thirteenth  day  of  Adar  drawing  near,"  when  the  de- 
cree obtained  by  flaman  for  the  destruction  of  the  Jews  was 
to  be  put  in  execution,  their  adversaries  every  where 
prepared  to  act  against  them  according  to  the  con-  Ami.^?! 
tents  of  it.  And  the  Jews,  on  the  other  hand,  by 
virtue  of  the  second  decree  above  mentioned,  which  was  ob- 
tained in  their  favour  by  Esther  and  JVJordecai,  gathered 
themselves  together  in  every  city  where  they  dwelt,  through- 
out all  the  provinces  of  king  Artaxerxes,  to  provide  for 
their  defence  ;  so  that,  on  the  said  thirteenth  of  Adar, 
through  the  means  of  these  two  different  and  discordant  de- 
crees, a  war  was  commenced  between  the  Jews  and  their 
enemies  throughout  the  whole  Persian  empire.  But  the 
rulers  of  the  provinces,  and  the  lieutenants,  the  deputies,  and 
other  officers  of  the  king,  knowing  in  what  power  Esther  and 
Mordecai  were  then  with  him,  through  fear  of  them,  so  fa- 
voured the  Jews,  that  they  prevailed  every  where  against  all 
that  rose  up  against  them  ;  and,  on  that  day,  throughout  the 
whole  empire,  slew  of  their  enemies  seventy-five  thousand 
persons,  and  in  the  city  of  Shushan,  on  that  day  and  the  next, 
eight  hundred  more,  among  which  were  the  ten  sons  of  Ha- 
man,  whom,  by  a  special  order  from  the  king,  they  caused  all 

n  Ctesias.  o  Esther  ix.     Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  li,  c.  6. 


42t)  COifNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OK  [I'ART   I. 

to  be  hanged,  perchance  upon  the  same  gallows   on  which 
Haman  their  father  had  been  hanged  before. 

The  Jews  being  thus  delivered  from  this  dangerous  design, 
which  threatened  them  with  no  less  than  utter  extirpation, 
they  made  great  rejoicings  for  it  on  the  two  days  following, 
that  is,  on  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  days  of  the  said  month 
of  Adar.  And,  by  the  order  of  Esther  and  Mordecai,  these 
two  days,  with  the  thirteenth  that  preceded  them,  were 
set  apart  and  consecrated  to  be  annually  observed  for 
ever  after  in  commemoration  hereof;  the  thirteenth  as  a 
fast,  l)ecause  of  the  destruction  on  that  day  intended  to 
have  been  brought  upon  them,  and  the  other  two  as  a  feast, 
because  of  their  deliverance  from  it.''  And  both  this  fast  and 
this  feast  they  constantly  observe  every  year  on  those  days 
even  to  this  lime.'^  The  fast  they  call  the  fast  of  Esther, 
and  the  feast  the  fea«t  of  l'urim,from  the  Persian  word  Purim, 
(which  signilietfi  lots.)  because  it  was  by  the  casting  of  lots 
that  Haman  did  set  out  this  time  for  their  destruction.  This 
feast  is  the  Bacchanals  of  the  Jews,  which  they  celebrate 
with  ail  manner  of  rejoicing,  mirth,  and  jollity  ;  and  therein 
indulge  themselves  in  all  manner  of  luxurious  excesses,  es- 
pecially in  drinking  wine  even  to  drunkenness,  which  they 
think  part  of  the  duty  of  the  solemnity,  because  it  was  by 
the  means  of  tlie  wine  banquet  (they  say)  that  Esther  made 
the  king's  heart  merry,  and  brought  him  into  that  good  hu- 
mour which  inclined  him  to  grant  the  request  which  she 
made  unto  him  for  their  deliverance  ;  and  therefore  they 
think  they  ought  to  make  their  hearts  merry  also  when  they 
celebrate  the  commemoration  of  it.  During  this  festival,  the 
book  of  Esther  is  solemnly  read  in  all  their  synagogues  from 
the  beginning  to  the  end,  at  which  they  are  all  to  be  present, 
men,  women,  children,  and  servants,  because  all  these  had 
their  parts  in  this  deliverance  which  Esther  obtained  for 
them.  And  as  often  as  the  name  of  Haman  occurs  in  the 
reading  of  this  book,  the  usage  is  for  them  all  to  clap  with 
their  hands,  and  stamp  with  their  Ceet,  and  cry  out,  Let  his 
memory  perish.  This  is  the  last  feast  of  the  year  among  them  : 
for  the  next  that  follows,  is  the  passover,  which  always  falls 
in  the  middle  of  the  month  which  begins  the  Jewish  year. 
The  Athenians,  having  provided  themselves  with  another 

fleet  after  the  loss  of  that  in  Egypt,""  sent  Cimon  with 
^"■3x^15  two  hundred  sail  atjaiii  into  Cyprus,  there  to  carry  on 

the  war  against  the  Persians;  where  he  took  Citium  and 
Malum,  and  several  other  cities,  and  sent  sixty  sail  into  Egypt 

p  Esther  ix.  20—22.     Josephus  Antiq.  lib.  11,  c.  6. 

q  Talmud  in   Megiiiah.     JVlaimonides  in  Megillab.     Buxtorfii  Synagoge 
Jiidaica,  c.  29. 

r  Phitarclms  in  Cinione.     Tliiiovdides,  lib,  1.     Diod.  Sic.  lib.  11. 


HOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AKD  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  421 

to  the  assistance  of  Amyrtaeus.  At  the  same  time  Artabasus 
was  in  those  seas  with  a  fleet  of  three  hundred  sail,  and  Me- 
gabyzus,  the  other  general  of  king  Artaxerxes,  had  a  land 
army  of  three  hundred  thousand  men  on  the  coasts  of  Cilicia  ; 
but  neither  of  them  had  the  success  in  this  war  which  they 
had  in  the  last.     For. 

Cimon,  on  the  return  of  his  ships  from  Egypt,  fell  on  Ar- 
tabasus, and  having  taken  an  hundred  of  his  ships,  and 
destroyed  several  others,  pursued  the  remainder  to  A^rax.*i6.' 
the  coasts  of  Phoenicia  ;  and  being  flushed  with  this 
success,  on  his  return  landed  upon  Megabyzus  in  Cilicia,  and 
overthrew  him  also,  making  a  very  great  slaughter  of  his  nu- 
merous army,  and  then  sailed  back  again  to  Cyprus  with  a 
double  triumph. 

Artaxerxes,  hearing  of  these  great  losses  sustained  both  at 
sea  and  land,  became  weary  of  so  destructive  a  war;  and 
therefore,  upon  thorough  advice  taken  with  his  counsellors  and 
ministers,  came  to  a  resolution  of  putting  an  end  to  the  cala- 
mities of  it,  by  coming  to  an  accommodation  with  the  enemy  ; 
and  accordingly  sent  to  his  generals  and  commanders  who 
had  the  charge  of  the  Cyprian  war,  to  make  peace  with  the 
Athenians  on  the  best  terms  they  could. ^  Whereon  Mega- 
byzus and  Artabazus,  sending  ambassadors  to  Athens  to  make 
the  proposal,  plenipotentiaries  were  appointed  on  each  side 
to  treat  of  the  matter:  and  they  came  to  an  agreement  on 
these  terms  :  1st.  That  all  the  Grecian  cities  in  Asia  should 
have  their  liberty,  and  be  left  free  to  live  according  to  their 
own  laws;  2dly.  That  no  Persian  ship  of  war  should  any 
more  appear  on  any  of  those  seas,  which  lie  from  the  Cya- 
nean  to  the  Chelidonean  islands,  that  is,  from  the  Euxiue  Sea 
to  the  coasts  of  Pamphylia  ;  3dly.  That  no  Persian  com- 
mander should  come  with  an  army  by  land  within  three  days' 
journey  of 'those  seas;  4thly.  That  the  Athenians  should  no 
more  invade  any  of  the  territories  of  king  Artaxerxes. 
Which  articles  being  ratified  and  sworn  to  on  both  sides, 
peace  was  concluded.  And  so  this  war  ended,  after  it  had 
continued,  from  the  time  that  the  Athenians  burned  Sardis 
(which  was  the  first  beginning  of  it.)  full  lifty-one  years,  to 
the  destruction  of  a  vast  number  of  men  on  both  sides.  In 
the  interim  Cimon  died  at  Citium,  and  the  Athenians  return- 
ed with  his  corpse  into  Athens,  and  after  (his  came  no  more 
into  those  seas. 

King  Artaxerxes,  being  continually  solicited  by  his  mother 
to  deliver  to  her  Inarus  and  the  -Athenians  who  were 
taken  with  him  in  Egypt,  that  she  might  revenge  on  Arta![^^\ 
them  the  death  of  her  son  Achasmenides,  after  having 

s  DJodor.  Sic.  lib.  11.    Plutarchus  in  Cimone. 


422  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OP  [PART  I. 

for  five  years  resisted  her  unwearied  and  restless  importuni- 
ties, was  at  last  tired  out  by  them  to  yield  to  her  request; 
and  the  prisoners  were  dehvercd  to  her:*  whereon  the  cruel 
woman,  without  having  any  regard  to  the  public  faith  which 
had  been  phghlcd  for  their  safety,  caused  Inarus  to  be  cruci- 
fied, and  the  heads  of  all  (he  rest  to  be  struck  off;"  at  which 
Megabyzus  was  cxcecditigly  grieved  and  offended  ;  for  it  being 
on  his  engagement  for  their  safely  that  they  had  surrendered 
themselves,  he  thought  it  a  great  dishonour  done  him  that  it 
was  thus  violated,  and  therefore  retired  in  discontent  into 
Syria,  the  province  of  which  he  was  governor,  and,  to  revenge 
the  wrong,  there  raised  an  army,  and  rebelled  against  the 

To  repress  this  rebellion,  Artaxerxes  sent  Osiris,  a  prime 

nobleman  of  his  court,   with  two  hundred  thousand 
Artaxf^i?.  nien,  into  Syria. ^     But  Megabyzus,  having  met  him 

in  battle,  wounded  him,  and  took  him  prisoner,  and 
put  his  whole  army  to  flight.  But  Artaxerxes,  having  sent  a 
messenger  to  demand  him,  Pdegabjzus  forthwith  released 
him,  and,  as  soon  as  his  wounds  were  healed,  sent  him  back 
again  to  the  king. 
The  next  year  following,  the  king  sent  another  army  against 

him,  under  the  command  of  Menoshtanes,  son  to  Ar- 
A?ikt!%.  tarius,  governor  of  Babylon,  and  one  of  his  brothers. >' 

But  he  had  no  better  fortune  thisyear  than  the  formerge- 
neral  had  in  the  last ;  for,  being  in  the  same  manner  vanquished 
and  put  to  flight,  iMegabyzus  gained  a  great  victory  over  him. 
Whereby  Artaxerxes  perceiving  that  he  could  not  prevail 
against  him  by  force  of  arms,  sent  Artarius  his  brother,  and 
Amytis  his  sister,  who  was  wife  to  Megabyzus,  with  several 
other  persons  of  quality,  to  reconcile  him  unto  him,  and 
bring  him  by  fair  means  to  return  to  his  duty  :  by  whose  in- 
terposition the  difference  being  made  up,  the  king  granted 
him  his  pardon,  and  he  returned  again  to  court.  But  while 
the  king  was  hunting,  a  lion  having  raised  himself  up  upon  his 
hinder  leys  against  him,  IMegabyzus,  who  was  then  present, 
out  of  his  zeal  to  extricate  the  king  from  this  danger,  threw  a 
dart  at  the  lion,  and  slew  him.  But  Artaxerxes,  laying  hold 
of  this  light  pretence  to  express  the  bitter  rancour  which  he 
still  retained  in  his  mind  against  him  for  his  late  revolt,  or- 
dered his  head  to  be  struck  otF.  for  presuming  to  strike  at 
the  beast  before  him  ;  and  it  was  with  difficulty  that  Amytis 
his  wife,  and  Hamestris  her  mother,  with  their  joint  petitions, 
prevailed  so  fiir  in  his  behalf,  that  his  sentence  of  death  was 
changed  into  that  of  banishment :  whereon  he  was  sent  to 
Cyrta,  a  place  on  the  Red  Sea,  there  to  lead  the  rest  of  his 
t  Ctesias.  n  Thucyd.  lib.  L.Ctesias.  x  Ctesias.  yldern. 


nOOK  V.J  THE  OLD  AiND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  42o 

life  under  confinement.  But  after  he  had  lived  there  five 
years,  having  made  his  escape  from  thence,  and,  under  the 
habit  and  disguiseof  a  leper,  gotsafc  to  his  own  house  at  Susa, 
he  was  there,  by  the  means  of  his  wife  and  her  mother,  again 
restored  to  the  king's  favour,  and  continued  in  it  ever  after 
to  the  time  of  his  death,  which  hapj)?ried  some  years  after, 
in  the  seventy -sixth  year  of  his  age,  and  was  then  very  much 
lamented  by  the  king  and  al!  his  court ;  for  he  was  the  ablest 
man,  both  in  council  and  war,  that  was  in  the  whole  empire, 
and  to  him  Artaxerxes  owed  his  life,  as  well  as  his  crown,  at 
his  first  accession  to  the  government.  But  it  is  a  dangerous 
thing  for  a  subject  to  have  too  much  obliged  his  prince  ;  and 
this  was  the  cause  of  all  the  misfortunes  that  happened  unto 
him. 

Ezra  continued  in  the  government  of  Judea  till  the  end  of 
this  year,  and,  by  virtue  of  the  commission  he  had  from  the 
king,  and  the  powers  granted  him  thereby,  he  reformed  the 
whole  state  of  the  Jewish  church  according  to  the  law  of 
Moses,  in  which  he  was  excellently  learned,  and  settled  it 
upon  that  bottom  upon  which  it  afterward  stood  to  the  time 
of  our  Saviour.^  The  two  chief  things  which  he  had  to  do, 
were  to  restore  the  observance  of  the  Jewish  law,  according 
to  the  ancient  approved  usages  which  had  been  in  practice 
before  the  captivity,  under  Ihe  direction  of  the  prophets,  and 
to  collect  together  and  set  forth  a  correct  edition  of  the  holy 
Scriptures;  in  the  performance  of  both  which,  the  Jews  tell 
us,  he  had  the  assistance  of  what  they  call  the  great  syna- 
gogue,^ which  they  tell  us,  was  a  convention,  consisting  of  one 
hundred  and  twenty  men,  who  lived  all  at  the  same  time 
under  the  presidency  of  Ezra,  and  were  assisting  to  him  in 
both  these  two  works ;  and.  among  these,  they  named  Daniel, 
and  his  three  friends,  Shadrach,  Meshach,  and  Abednego,  as 
the  first  of  them,  and  Simon  the  Just  as  the  last  of  them  ; 
though,  from  the  last  mention  which  we  have  of  Daniel  in 
the  holy  Scriptures,  to  the  time  of  Simon  the  Just,  there  had 
passed  no  less  than  two  hundred  and  fifty  years.  But  all  this 
they  reconcile  by  that  absurd  and  wretched  account  which 
they  give  of  the  history  of  those  times  ;  for  they  tell  us,  that 
the  whole  Persian  empire  lasted  only  fifty-two  years,  (as  hath 
been  afore  taken  notice  of.)  and  that  the  Darius  whom  we 
call  Darius  Hystaspes,  was  the  Darius  whom  Alexander  con- 
quered, and  that  the  same  was  the  Artaxerxes,  (which  they 
will  have  to  be  the  common  name  of  all  the  kings  of  Persia 
in  those  times,)  who  sent  Ezra  first,  and  afterward  Nehemiah, 

z  Ezra  viii.  ix.  x.     Neb.  ii. 

a  Vide  Davidem  Ganz.  aliosque  Judaeorum  Historicos,  k,  Buxtorfii  Ttb«»- 
riadem.  c.  x. 


424  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HI3TOKY  OP  [pART  /. 

to  Jerusalem,  to  restore  the  state  of  the  Jews ;  and  that  Simon 
the  Just  was  the  same  with  Jaddua  the  high-prrest,  who  re- 
ceived Alexander  at  Jerusalem.  And,  according  to  this  ac- 
count, thej  might  indeed  all  have  lived  together  in  the 
seventh  year  of  this  Darius  (or  Artaxerxes,  as  they  would 
call  him,)  when  they  say  Ezra  first  went  to  Jerusalem;  for 
that  was  in  the  middle  of  the  said  fifty-two  years,  according 
to  their  computation,  at  which  time  Jaddua  might  very  well 
have  been  of  an  age  capable  to  assist  in  (hose  councils  ;  and 
it  is  not  impossible  but  Daniel  might  have  lived  down  to  it, 
for  the  Scriptures  give  us  no  account  of  his  death.  The 
truth  of  this  matter  seemeth  most  likely  to  have  been,  that 
these  one  hundred  and  twenty  men  were  such  principal  elders 
as  lived  in  a  continued  succession  from  the  first  return  of  the 
Jews,  after  the  Babylonish  captivity,  to  the  death  of  Simon 
the  Just,  and  laboured  in  their  several  times,  some  after 
others,  in  the  carrying  on  of  the  two  great  works  above  men- 
tioned, till  both  were  fully  completed  in  the  time  of  the  said 
Simon  the  Just  (who  was  made  high-priest  of  the  Jews  in  the 
twenty-fifth  year  after  the  death  of  Alexander  the  Great,)  and 
Ezra  had  the  assistance  of  such  of  them  as  lived  in  his  time. 
But  the  whole  conduct  of  the  work,  and  the  glory  of  accom- 
plishing it,  is,  by  the  Jews,  chiefly  attributed  to  him,  under 
whose  presidency,  they  tell  us,  it  was  done.  And  therefore 
they  look  on  him  as  another  Moses :**  for  the  law,  they  say, 
was  given  by  Moses,  but  it  was  revived  and  restored  by 
Ezra,  after  it  had  been  in  a  manner  extinguished  and  lost  in 
the  Babyloiiish  captivity  :  and  therefore  they  reckon  him  as 
the  second  founder  of  it.  And  it  is  a  common  opinion  among 
them,"^  that  he  was  Malachi  the  prophet;  that  he  was  called 
Ezra  as  his  proper  name,  and  Malachi  (which  signifieth  an 
angel  or  messenger)  from  his  office,  because  he  was  sent,  as 
the  angel  and  messenger  of  God,  to  restore  again  the  Jewish 
religion,  and  establish  it  in  the  same  manner  as  it  was  be- 
fore the  captivity,  on  the  foundation  of  the  law  and  the 
prophets.  And  indeed,  by  virtue  of  that  ample  commission 
which  he  had  from  king  Artaxerxes,  he  had  an  opportunity  of 
doing  more  herein  than  any  other  of  his  nation  ;  and  he 
executed  all  the  powers  thereof  to  the  utmost  he  was  able, 
for  the  resettling  both  of  the  ecclesiastical  and  political  state 
of  the  Jews,  in  the  best  posture  they  were  then  capable 
of;  and  from  hence  his  name  is  in  so  high  esteem  and  vene- 
ration among  the  Jews,  that  it  is  a  common  saying  among 

b  Vide  Buxtorfii  Tiberiadem,  c.  10. 

c  Abraham  Zacutus  in  Juchasin.    David  Ganz.    Chald«us  Paraphraste? 
in  Malachiam.     Bustorfii  Tiberias,  c.3. 


UOOK   V.J  THt  OLD  A.\D  NEW  TESTAJHEM's.  425 

their  writers,  that,  if  the  law  had  not  been  given  by  Moses, 
Ezra  was  worthy  by  whom  it  should  have  been  given. 

As  to  the  ancient  and  approved  usages  of  the  Jewish  ch'jrch, 
which  had  been  in  practice  before  the  captivity,  they  had, 
by  Jeshua  and  Zerubbabel,  with  the  chief  elders,  their  con- 
temporaries, and  by  others  that  after  succeeded  them,  been 
gathering  together  from  their  first  return  to   Jerusalem,  as 
they  could  be  recovered  from  the  memories  of  the  ancients 
of  their  nation,  who  had  either  seen   them  practised  them- 
selves before  the  captivity,  or  had  been  informed  concerning 
them  by  ther  parents,  or  others  who  had  lived  before  them  : 
all  these,  and  whatsoever  else   was  pretended  to  be  ot  the 
same  nature,  Ezra  brought  under  a   review  ;    and  having, 
after  due  examination,  allowed  such  of  them   as  were  to 
be  allowed,   and  settled  them  by  his  approbation  and  au- 
thority, they  gave  birth  to  what  the  Jews  now  call  their  oral 
law.     For  they  own  a  twofold  law  ;'^  the  first  the  written  law, 
which  is  recorded  in  the  holy  Scriptures  ;  and  the  second  the 
oral  law,  which  they  have  only  by  the  traditionof  their  elders. 
And  both  these,  they  say,  were  given  them  by  Moses  from 
Mount  Sinai  ;  of  which  the  former  only  was   committed  to 
writing,  and  the  other  delivered  down  to  them,  from  genera- 
tion to  generation,  by  the  tradition  of  tlie  elders.   And  there- 
fore holding  them  to  be  both  of  the  same  authority,  as  having 
both  of  them  the  same  divine  original,  they  think  themselves 
to  be  bound  as  much  by  the  latter  as  the  former,  or  rather 
much  more  :  for  the  written  law  is,  they  say,  in  many  places 
obscure,   scanty,  and  defective,  and   could    be   no    perfect 
rule  to  them  without  the  oral  law  f  which  containing,  ac- 
cording to  them,  a  full,  complete,  and  perfect  interpreta- 
tion of  all  that  is  written  in  the  other,  supplies  all  the  defects, 
and  solves  all  the  difficulties  of  it.     And  therefore  they  ob- 
serve the  written  law  no  otherwise  than  according  as  it  is  ex- 
pounded and  interpreted  by  their  oral  law.     And  hence  it  is 
a  common  saying  among  them,  that  the  covenant  was  made 
with  them,  not  upon  the  written  law,  but  upon  the  oral  law. 
And  therefore  they  do  in  a  manner  lay  aside   the  former  to 
make  room  for  the  latter,  and  resolve  their  whole  religion 
into  their  traditions,  in  the  same  manner  as  the  Romanists  do 
theirs,  having  no  farther  regard  to  the  written  word  of  God 
than  as  it  agrees  with  their  traditionary  explications  of  it,  but 
always  prefe'rring  them  thereto,   though  in  many  particulars 

d  Vide  Btixtorfium  de   Opere  Talmudico,  h.  Synagogam  Judaicam  ejus- 
dena,  &.  Maimonidis  Praefationem  ad  Seder  Zeraim. 

e  Maimonidis  Praefatio   ad   Seder  Zeraim.     Biistorfii  Synagoga  Jiidaica, 
c.  3,  &.  ejusdem  Recensio  Operis  Talmudici.     Shickardi  Bechinath  Happe- 
rushim,  disp.  1,  sec.  1.     Hottingeri  Thesaurus, lib.  2.  c.3,  sec.  3.     Lightfool's 
Harmony  of  the  Four  Kvan2;eris'?;  sec.  23. 
Vol.  l.  "  .T-l 


426  L0.\\\EX10-\  OF  THL'   UJs'i'OKY  Oi'  [PART  I- 

they  are  (juitc  contradictory  to  it ;  which  is  a  corruption  that 
had  grown  to  a  great  height  among  them  even  in  our  Saviour's 
time;  for  he  chargeth  them  with  it,  and  tells  them,  (Mark 
vii.  13,)  that  "they  made  the  word  of  God  of  none  effect 
through  their  traditions."  But  they  have  done  it  much 
more  since,  professing  a  greater  regard  to  the  latter  than  the 
former.  And  hence  it  is,  that  we  find  it  so  often  said  in  their 
writings,  that  the  words  of  tlic  scribes  are  lovely  above  the 
words  of  the  law;  that  the  words  of  the  law  are  weighty  and 
light,  but  the  words  of  the  scribes  are  all  weighty  ;  that  the 
words  of  the  elders  are  weightier  than  the  words  of  the  pro- 
phets, (where,  by  the  words  of  the  scribes  and  the  words  of 
the  elders,  they  mean  the  traditions  delivered  to  them  by 
their  scribes  and  elders;)  and,  in  other  places,  that  the  writ- 
ten text  is  only  as  water,  but  the  Mishnah  and  Talmud  (in 
which  are  contained  their  traditions)  are  as  wine  and  hippo- 
crass  :  and,  again,  that  tlie  written  law  is  only  as  salt,  but  the 
Mishnah  and  Talmud  as  pepper  and  sweet  spices.  And,  in 
many  other  sayings,  very  common  among  them,  do  they  ex- 
press the  high  veneration  which  they  bear  towards  the  oral  or 
traditionary  law,  and  the  little  regard  which  they  have  to  the 
written  word  of  God  in  comparison  of  it,  making  nothing  of 
the  latter  but  as  expounded  by  the  former,  as  if  the  written 
word  were  no  more  than  the  dead  letter,  and  the  traditionary 
law  alone  the  soul  that  gives  the  whole  life  and  essence  there- 
to. And  this  being  what  they  hold  of  their  traditions,  which 
they  call  their  oral  law,  the  account  which  they  give  of  its 
original  is  as  foUoweth. 

For  they  tell  us,  that  at  the  same  time  when  God  gave  unto 
Moses  the  law  on  Mount  Sinai,  he  gave  unto  him  also  the  in- 
terpretation of  it.  commanding  him  to  commit  the  former  to 
writing,  but  to  deliver  the  other  only  by  word  of  mouth,  to 
be  preserved  in  the  memories  of  men.  and  to  be  transmitted 
down  by  them,  from  generation  to  generation,  by  tradition 
only  '/  and  from  hence  the  former  is  called  the  written,  and 
the  other  the  oral  law.  And,  to  this  day,  all  the  determina- 
tions and  dictates  of  the  latter  arc  tcimed  by  (he  Jews  con- 
stitutions of  Moses  from  Mount  Sinai,  because  they  do  as 
firmly  believe  that  he  received  them  all  from  God,  in  his 
forty  days  converse  with  him  in  that  mount,  as  that  he  then 
received  the  written  text  itself:  that,  on  his  return  from  this 
converse,  he  brought  both  of  these  laws  with  him,  and  deli- 
vered them  unto  the  people  of  Israel  in  this  manner.  As 
soon  as  lie  was  returned  to  his  tent,  he  called  Aaron  thither 

f  Perke  Avoth,  c.  1.  Praefatio  Maimonidis  in  Seder  Zeraim  in  Pocockii 
Porta  Mosisj  p.  5,  6,  Lc.  Buxtoriii  Rtceiisio  Operis  Taltnudici.  David 
Ganz.     Zacutus  in  Juchasiii,£^i- 


BOOK  V.J  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAjyTEXtS.  427 

unto  him,  and  first  delivered  to  him  the  text,  which  was  to  be 
the  written  law,  and  after  that  the  interpretation  of  it,  which 
was  the  oral  law,  in  the  same  order  as  he  received  both  from 
God  in  the  mount.  Then  Aaron  arising,  and  seating  himself 
at  the  right-hand  of  Moses,  Eleazar  and  Ithamar,  his  sons, 
went  next  it;  and  being  taught  both  these  laws  at  the  feet  of 
the  prophet,  in  the  same  manner  as  Aaron  had  been,  they 
also  arose,  and  seated  themselves,  the  one  on  the  left-hand  of 
Moses,  and  the  other  on  the  right-hand  of  Aaron  ;  and  then 
the  seventy  elders,  who  constituted  the  Sanhedrim,  or  great 
senate  of  the  nation,  went  in,  and,  being  taught  by  Moses 
both  these  laws  in  the  same  manner,  they  also  seated  them- 
selves in  the  tent ;  and  then  entered  all  such  of  the  people 
as  were  desirous  of  knowing  the  law  of  God,  and  were 
taught  it  in  the  same  mamier  :  after  this,  Moses  withdrawing, 
Aaron  repeated  the  whole  of  both  laws,  as  he  had  heard  it 
from  him,  and  also  withdrew  ;  and  then  Eleazar  and  Ithamar 
repeated  the  same;  and,  on  their  withdrawing,  the  seventy 
elders  made  the  same  repetition  to  the  people  then  present; 
so  that  each  of  them  having  heard  both  these  laws  repeated 
to  them  four  times,  they  all  had  it  thereby  firmly  fixed  in 
their  memories:  and  that  then  they  dispersed  themselves 
among  the  whole  congregation,  and  communicated  to  all  the 
people  of  Israel  what  had  been  thus  delivered  unto  them  by 
the  prophet  of  God  :  that  they  did  put  the  text  into  writing, 
but  the  interpretation  of  it  they  delivered  down  only  by 
word  of  mouth  to  the  succeeding  generations  :  that  the  writ- 
ten text  contained  the  six  hundred  and  thirteen  precepts 
into  which  they  divide  the  law,  and  the  unvvritten  interpreta- 
tions, all  the  manners,  ways,  and  circumstances,  that  were  to 
be  observed  in  the  keeping  of  them  :  tbat,  after  this,  towards 
the  end  of  the  fortieth  year  from  their  coming  up  out  of  the 
land  of  Egypt,  in  the  beginning  of  the  eleventh  month 
(which  fell  about  the  middle  of  our  January,)  Moses  calling 
all  the  people  of  Israel  together,  acquainted  them  of  the  ap- 
proaching time  of  his  death  ;  and  therefore  ordered,  that  if 
any  of  them  had  forgot  aught  of  what  he  had  delivered  to 
them,  they  should  repair  to  him,  and  he  would  repeat  to 
them  anew  what  had  slipped  their  memories,  and  farther  ex- 
plain unto  them  every  difficulty  and  doubt  which  might  arise 
in  their  minds  concerning  what  he  had  taught  them  of  the 
law  of  their  God  :  and  that  hereon,  they  applying  to  him  all 
the  remaining  time  of  his  life,  that  is,  from  the  said  beginning 
of  the  eleventh  month  till  the  sixth  day  of  the  twelfth  month, 
was  employed  in  instructing  them  anew  in  the  text,  which  they 
call  the  written  law,  and  in  the  interpretations  of  it,  which  they 
call  the  oral  law  :  and  that,  on  the  said  sixth  day,  having  de- 


42S  I  O-ViVEXlON  OF  THE  HISTtJRV  OF  [I'ART    1- 

Itvercd  to  them  thirteen  copies  of  the  written  law,  all  copied 
out  with  his  own  hand,  from  the  beginning  of  Genesis  to  the 
end  of  Deuteronomy,  one  to  teach  of  the  twelve  tribes,  to 
be  kept  by  them  throughout  their  generations,  and  the 
thirteenth  to  th<'  Levites,  to  be  laid  up  by  them  in  the  taber- 
nacle before  the  Lord;  and  having  moreover  then  anew  re- 
peated the  oral  law  to  Joshua  his  successor,  ho  wont,  on  the 
:>eventh  day,  up  into  Mount  Ncbo,  and  there  died;  that, 
after  his  death,  Joshua  delivered  the  said  oral  law  to  the 
elders  who  after  succeeded  him,  and  they  delivered  it  to  the 
prophets,  and  the  prophets  transmitted  it  down  from  each 
other,  till  it  came  to  Jeremiah,  who  delivered  it  to  Baruch, 
and  Baruch  to  Ezra,  by  whom  it  was  delivered  to  the  men  of 
the  great  synagogue,  the  last  of  whom  was  Simon  the  Just : 
that  by  him  it  was  delivered  to  Antigonus  of  Socho,  and  by 
liim  to  Jose  the  son  of  Johanan,  and  by  him  to  Jose  the  son  of 
Joezer,  and  by  him  to  Nathan  the  Arbelite,  and  Joshua  the 
son  of  Perachiah,  and  by  them  to  Judah  the  son  of  Tabbai, 
and  Simeon  the  son  of  Shalah,  and  by  them  to  Shemaiah 
and  Abtalion,  and  by  them  to  Hillel.and  by  Hillel  to  Simeon 
his  son,  who  is  supposed  to  have  been  the  same  (hat  took  our 
Saviour  into  his  arms  when  he  was  brought  to  the  temple  to 
be  there  presented  to  the  Lord  at  the  time  of  his  mother's 
purification  ;  and  by  Simeon  it  was  delivered  to  Gamaliel  his 
son,  ((he  same  at  whose  (eet  Paul  was  brought  up,)  and  by 
him  to  Simeon  his  son,  by  him  to  Gamaliel  hi?  son,  and  b)  him 
to  Simeon  his  son,  and  by  him  to  Rabbali,  Judah  Hakkadosh 
his  son, who  wrote  it  into  the  book  which  they  call  the  Mishnah. 

But  all  this  is  mere  fiction,  spun  out  of  the  fertile  inven- 
tion of  the  Talmudists,  without  the  least  foundation,  either  in 
Scripture,  or  in  any  autlicntic  history  for  it.  But  since  all 
this  is  now  made  a  pait  of  the  Jewish  creed,  and  they  do  as 
tirmly  believe  their  traditions  to  have  (bus  come  from  God 
in  the  manner  I  have  related,  as  they  do  the  written  word 
itself,  and  have  now,  as  it  were,  wholly  resolved  their  religion 
into  these  traditions,  there  is  no  understanding  uhat  their  reli- 
gion at  present  is  witjiout  it.  And  it  is  for  (his  reason  that  I 
have  here  inserted  it. 

But  the  truth  of  the  matter  is  this :  after  the  death  of  Si- 
mon (he  Just,s  (here  arose  a  sort  of  men,  uhom  they  call  the 
Tanaim,  or  the  Mishnical  doctors,  that  made  it  their  business 
to  study,  and  descant  upon  (hose  traditions  which  had  been 
received  and  allowed  by  Ezra  and  the  men  of  the  great 
synagogue,  and  to  draw  inferences  and  consequences  from 
them,  all  which  they  ingrafted  in  the  body  of  these  ancient 

g  Zemech  David.    Jinhasin  Shalsheletli  Haccaftala.     Biixlorfii  Lexicon 
Rahbiniciim.  n.  2«10.  2«l  1. 


r^OOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  4"2'J 

traditions,  as  if  they  had  been  as  authentic  as  the  other ; 
which  example  being  followed  by  those  who  after  succeeded 
them  in  this   profession,  they  continually  added  their  own 
imaginations  to  what  they  had  received  from  those  that  went 
before  them  ;  whereby  these  tiaditions  becoming  a?  a  snow- 
ball, the  farther  they  rolled  down  from  one  generation  i.o  an- 
other, the  more  they  gathered,  and  the  greater  the  bulk  of 
them  grew.     And  thus  it  went  on  to  the  middle  of  the  se- 
cond century  after  Christ,  when  Antonius  Pius  governed  the 
Roman   empire  ;  by  which   time  they  found  it  necessary  to 
put    all    these  traditions  into  writing  :  for  they  were  then 
grown  to  so  great  a   number,  and  enlarged    to    so    huge  a 
heap,  as  to   exceed  the  possibility  of  being  any  longer  pre- 
served by  the  memory  of  men.     And  besides,  on  the  second 
destruction  which  their  country  had  undergone  from  the  Ro- 
mans a  little  before,  in  the  reign  of  Adrian,  the  preceding 
emperor,  most  of  their  learned  men  having  been  cui  off,  and 
the  chiefest  of  their  schools  broken  up  and  dissolved,  vast 
numbers  of  their  people  dissipated  and  driven  out  of  their 
land,  the  usual  method  of  preserving  their  traditions  had  then 
in  a  great  measure  failed:  and  therefore  there  being  danger, 
that,  under  these  disadvantages,  they  might  be  all  forgotten  and 
lost,  for  the  preventing  hereof,  it  was  resolved,  that    they 
should  be  all  collected  together,  and  put  into  a  book  ;  and 
Rabbi  Judah,  the  son    of  Simeon,  who,  from  the  reputed 
sanctity  of  his  life,  was  called  Hakkado-^h,  that  is,  the  holy,  and 
was  then  rector  of  the  school  which  they  had  at  Tiberias  in 
Galilee,  And  president  of  the  Sanhedrim  that  there  sat,  un- 
dertook the  work,  and  compiled  it  in  six  books,  each  consist- 
ing of  several  tracts,  which  all  together  make  up  the  number 
of  sixty-three;  in  which,  under  their  proper  heads,  he  me- 
thodically digested  all  that  hitherto  had    been  delivered  to 
them  of  their  law  and  their  religion  by  the  tradition  of  their 
ancestors.     And  this  is  the  book  called  the  Mishnah  ;  which 
book  was  forthwith  received  by  the  Jews  with  great  venera- 
tion throughout  all  their  dispersions,  and  hath  ever  since  been 
held  in  high  esteem  among  them  ;  for  their  opinion  of  it  is, 
that  all  the  particulars  therein  contained  were  dictate  d  by 
God  himself  to  Moses  from  Mount  Sinai,  as  vv^ell  as  the  writ- 
ten word  itself,  and  consequently  must  be  of  the  same  divine 
authority  with  it,  and  ought  to  be    as  sacredly  observed. 
And   therefore,  as  soon  as  it  was  published,  it  became  the 
subject  of  the  studies  of  all  their  learned  men,  and  the  chief- 
est of  them  both  in  Judea  and  Babylonia  employed  them- 
selves to  make  comments  on  it :  and  these,  with  the  Mishnah, 
make  up  both  their  Talmuds,  that  is,  the  Jerusalem  Talmud, 
and  the  Babylonish  Talmud.    These  comments  they  call  the 


130  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART  I. 

Gemara,  that  is,  the  complement,  because  by  them  the  Mish- 
nah  is  full)  explained,  and  the  whole  traditionary  doctrine 
of  their  law  and  their  religion  completed  :  for  the  Mishnah 
is  the  text,  and  the  Gemara  the  comment ;  and  both  together 
is  what  they  call  the  Talmud.  That  made  by  the  Jews  of 
Judea,  is  called  the  Jerusalem  Talmud  ;  and  that  made  by 
the  Jews  of  Babylonia,  is  called  the  Babylonish  Taluiud. 
The  former  was  completed  about  the  year  of  our  Lord  300, 
and  is  published  in  one  large  folio  :  the  latter  was  published 
about  two  hundred  years  after,  in  the  beginning  of  the  sixth 
century,  and  hath  had  several  editions  since  the  invention  of 
printing;  the  last,  published  at  Amsterdam,  is  in  twelve  fo- 
lios. And  in  these  two  Talmuds  (the  law  and  the  prophets 
being  in  a  manner  quite  jostled  out  by  them)  is  contained 
the  whole  of  the  Jewish  religion  that  is  now  professed  among 
them.  But  the  Babylonish  Talmud  is  that  which  they  chiefly 
follow  :  for  the  other,  that  is,  the  Jerusalem  Talmud,  being 
obscure  and  hard  to  be  understood,  it  is  not  now  much  regard- 
ed by  them.  But  this  and  the  Mishnah  being  the  ancientest 
books  which  they  have,  (except  the  Chaldee  paraphrases  of 
Onkelos  and  Jonathan,)  and  both  written  in  the  language  and 
style  of  the  Jews  of  Judea,  our  countryman,  Dr.  Lightfoot, 
hath  mane  very  good  use  of  them  in  explaining  several  places 
of  the  New  Testament,  by  parallel  phrases  and  sayings  out 
of  them.  For  the  one  being  composed  about  the  J  50th  year 
of  our  Lord,  and  the  other  about  the  300th,  the  idioms,  pro- 
verbial sayings,  and  phraseologies  used  in  our  Saviour's  time, 
might  very  well  be  preserved  in  them.  But  the  other  Tal- 
mud being  written  in  the  language  and  style  of  Babylonia, 
and  not  compiled  till  about  the  500th  year  our  Lord,  or,  as 
some  will  have  it,  much  later,  this  cannot  so  well  serve  for 
this  purpose.  However,  it  is  now  the  Alcoran  of  the  Jews, 
into  which  they  have  resolved  all  their  faith  and  all  their  re- 
ligion, although  framttd  (almost  with  the  same  imposture  as 
that  of  Mahomet)  out  of  doctrines  falsely  pretended  to  be 
brought  from  heaven.  And  in  this  book  all  that  now  pre- 
tend to  any  learning  among  Ihem  place  their  studies  ;  and  no 
one  can  be  a  master  in  their  schools,  or  a  teacher  in  their 
synagogues,  who  is  not  well  instructed  and  versed  herein, 
that  is,  not  only  in  the  text,  which  is  the  Mishnah,  but  also 
in  the  comment  thereon,  which  is  tlje  Gemara.  And  this 
comment  they  so  highly  esteem  beyond  the  other,  that  the 
name  of  Gemara  is  wholly  engrossed  by  it ;  the  Gemara  of 
the  Babylonish  Talmud  being  that  only  which  they  now 
usually  understand  by  that  word.  For  this,  with  the  Mishnah 
to  which  it  is  added,  they  think,  doth  truly  complete  and  make 
up  the  whole  of  their  religion,  as  fully  and  perfectly  con- 


iJOOK  v.]  THE  0L1>  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  431 

taining  all  the  doctrines,  rules,  and  rites  thereof;  and  there- 
fore it  is,  in  their  opinion,  the  most  deserving  of  that  name, 
which  signifieth  what  completes^  Jills  up.  ov  perfects  ;  tor  this 
is  the  meaning  of  the  word  in  the  Hebrew  language.  Out 
of  this  Talmud,  Maimonides  hath  made  an  abstract,  contain- 
ing only  the  resolutions  or  determmations  made  therein  on 
every  case,  without  the  descants,  disputes,  fables,  and  other 
trash  under  which  they  lay  buried  in  that  vast  load  of  rub- 
bish. This  work  is  entitled  by  him  Yad  Hachazakah,  and  is 
one  of  the  completest  digests  of  law  that  was  ever  made  ;  I 
mean,  not  as  to  the  matter,  but  in  respect  only  of  the  clear- 
ness of  the  style  and  method  in  which  it  is  composed,  the 
filthy  mass  of  dirt  from  under  which  he  dug  it,  and  the  com- 
prehensive manner  in  which  he  hath  digested  the  whole- 
Others  among  them  have  attempted  the  like  work  ;  but  none 
have  been  able  to  exceed  or  come  nigh  him  herein.  And, 
for  this  and  other  of  his  writings,  he  is  deservedly  esteemed 
the  best  author  among  them.  They  who  professed  this  sort 
of  learning,  that  is,  taught  and  propagated  these  traditionary- 
doctrines  among  them,  have  been  distinguished  by  several 
different  titles  and  appellations,  according  to  the  different 
ages  in  which  they  lived.  From  the  time  of  the  men  of  the 
great  synagogue,  to  the  publishing  of  the  Mishnah,  the}  were 
called  Tannim  ;^  and  they  are  the  Mishnical  doctors,  out  of 
whose  doctrines  and  tradition?  the  Mishnah  was  composed. 
And  from  the  time  of  the  publishing  of  the  Mishnah,  to  the 
publishing  of  the  Babylonish  Talmud,  they  were  called 
Amoriam;^  and  they  are  the  Gemanca/ doctors,  out  of  whose 
doctrines  and  traditions  the  Geniara  was  composed.  And, 
for  about  one  hundred  }ears  after  the  publishing  of  the  7a/- 
inud,  they  were  called  Sehnraim,^  ai»d  afier  that  Geonim.^ 
And  these  were  the  several  classes  in  which  their  learned 
men  have  been  ranked,  according  to  the  several  ages  in 
which  they  Ibrmerl}  lived.  But  for  these  latter  times,  the 
general  name  of  Rabbi  is  that  only  whereby  their  learned 
men  are  called,  there  being  no  other  title  whereby  they  have 
been  distinguished  for  near  seven  hundred  years  past.  For, 
about  the  year  1040,  all  their  schools  in  Mesopotamia,  where 
only  they  enjoyed  these  high  titles,  being  destroyed,  and  all 

h  The  word  Tanaim  hath  its  derisation  from  Tanuh,  w  hicb  signifieth  to 
deliver  by  tradition,  and  is  the  same  in  Chaldeewith  Shanahm  the  Hebrew, 
from  v\  hence  the  word  Mishnoh  is  derived. 

i  Ihat  is,  Dirlati.rs ;  because  they  dictated  those  explications  upon  the 
Mishnah,  which  are  contained  in  the  Gtviaru. 

k  That  is,  Opinionists  ;  for  they  did  not  dictate  any  doctrines,  but  only  in- 
ferred opinions  by  disputation,  and  probable  arguments,  from  what  had 
been  afore  dictated  and  received  in  the  J\Iii,hnah  and  Gtmara. 

I  That  is,  The  sublime  or  excellent  doctors;  they  were  so  called  from  the 
sublimity  and  excellency  of  their  learning. 


432  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OV  [PART  I. 

their  learned  men  thence  expelled  and  driven  out  by  the 
Mahometan  princes,  who  then  governed  in  those  parts,  they 
have,  since  that,  with  the  greatest  number  of  their  people, 
flocked  into  these  western  parts,  especially  into  Spain,  France, 
and  England.  And,  from  that  time,  all  these  pompous  titles 
which  they  affected  in  the  East  being  here  dropped,  they 
have  retained  none  other  for  their  learned  men,  from  that 
time,  but  that  of  Rabbi,  excepting  only,  that  those  of  them 
who  minister  in  their  synagogues  are  called  Chacams^^  that 
is,  wise  men. 

But  the  great  work  of  Ezra  was  his  collecting  together 
and  setting  forth  a  correct  edition  of  the  holy  Scriptures," 
which  he  laboured  much  in,  and  went  a  great  way  in  the 
perfecting  of  it.  This  both  Christians  and  Jews  give  him 
the  honour  of.  And  many  of  the  ancient  fathers  attribute 
more  to  him,  in  this  particular,  than  the  Jews  themselves  : 
for  they  hold,  that  all  the  Scriptures  were  lost  and  destroyed 
in  the  Babylonish  captivity,  and  that  Ezra  restored  them  all 
again  by  divine  revelation.  Thus  saith  Irenaeus,"^  and  thus 
say  Tertullian.P  Clemens  Alexandrinus,"i  Basil,'  and  others.^ 
But  they  had  no  other  foundation  for  it  than  that  fabulous  re- 
lation which  we  have  of  it  in  the  fourteenth  chapter  of  the 
second  apocryphal  book  of  Efdras,  a  book  too  absurd  for  the 
Romanists  themselves  to  receive  into  their  canon.  Indeed, 
in  the  time  of  Josiah,  through  the  impiety  of  the  two  prece- 
ding reigns  of  xVIanasseh  and  Amon,  the  book  of  the  law  was 
so  destroyed  and  lost,  that,  besides  that  copy  of  it  which  Hil- 
kiah  found  in  the  temple,^  there  was  then  none  other  to  be 
had  ;  for  the  surprise  which  Hilkiah  is  said  to  be  in  at  the 
finding  of  it,  and  the  grief  which  Josiah  expressed  at  the 
hearing  of  it  read,  do  plainly  show,  that  neither  of  them  had 
ever  seen  it  before.  And  if  the  king  and  the  high-priest,  who 
were  both  men  of  eminent  piety,  were  without  this  part  of 
holy  Scripture,  it  can  scarce  be  thought  that  any  one  else 
then  had  it.  But  so  religious  a  prince  as  king  Josiah  could 
not  leave  this  long  unremedied.  By  his  order,  copies  were 
forthwith  written  out  from  this  original ;  and  search  being 
made  for  all  the  other  parts  of  holy  Scripture,  both  in  the 
colleges  of  the  sons  of  the  prophets,  and  all  other  places 
where  they  could  be  found,  care  was  taken  for  transcripts  to 
be  made  out  of  these  also,  and  thenceforth  copies  of  the  whole 

la^Chacam,  in  the  Hebrew  language,  sigiiifieth  a  wise  ntatu 
n  Vide  Buxtorfii  Tiberiadeni,  c.  11. 

0  Adversus  Hasreses,  lib.  3,  c.  25.  p  De  Hnbitu  Mulierum,  c.  3. 
(|  Strom  1.  r  In  Epistola  adChiloiiem. 

s  trieronymus  contra  Helvidium.     Aiigustinus  de  Miraculis  Sacrse  Scrip- 
turae,  lib.  2.     Chrysost  'mus,  horn.  8,  in  Epist.  ad  Hebni?o= 

1  2  Kings  xxii.     2  Chron.  xxxiv. 


BOOK  v.]       THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  433 

became  multiplied  among  the  people,  all  those  who  were  de- 
sirous of  knowing  the  law  of  their  God,  either  writing  them 
out  themselves,  or  procuring  others  to  do  it  for  them.  So 
that,  though  within  a  few  years  after  the  holy  city  and  temple 
Avere  destroyed,  and  the  authentic  copy  of  the  law,  which 
was  laid  up  before  the  Lor^,  was  burned  and  consumed  with 
them  ;  yet  by  this  time  many  copies  both  of  the  law  and  the 
prophets,  and  all  the  other  sacred  writings,  were  got  into 
private  hands,  who  carried  them  with  them  into  their  capti- 
vity. That  Daniel  had  a  copy  of  the  holy  Scriptures  with 
him  in  Babylon  it  is  certain  ;  for  he  quotes  the  law,"  and  also 
makes  mention  of  the  prophecies  of  the  prophet  Jeremiah;'' 
which  he  could  not  do,  had  he  never  seen  them.  And,  in  the 
sixth  chapter  of  Ezra,  it  is  said^  that,  on  the  finishing  of  the 
temple,  in  the  sixth  year  of  Darius,  the  priests  and  the  Le- 
vites  were  settled  in  their  respective  functions,  according  as 
it  is  written  in  the  law  of  Moses.  But  how  could  they  do  this 
according  to  the  written  law,  if  they  had  not  copies  of  that  law 
then  among  them  ?  and  this  was  near  sixty  years  before  Ezra 
came  to  Jerusalem.  And  farther,  in  the  eighth  chapter  of 
Nehemiah,  when  the  people  called  for  the  law  of  Moses  to 
have  it  read  to  them,  they  did  not  pray  Ezra  to  get  it  anew 
dictated  unto  him,  but  that  he  should  bring  forth  the  book  of 
the  law  of  Moses,  which  the  Lord  had  commanded  to  Israel : 
which  plainly  shows,  that  the  book  was  then  well  known  to 
have  been  extant,  and  not  to  need  such  a  miraculous  expe- 
dient, as  that  of  a  divine  revelation,  for  its  restoration  5  and  it 
would  with  many  very  much  shock  the  faith  of  the  whole, 
should  it  be  held,  that  it  owed  its  present  being  to  such  a  re- 
vival;  it  being  obvious  for  sceptical  persons  in  this  case  to 
object,  that  he  who  should  be  said  thus  to  revive  it,  then 
forged  the  whole.  All  that  Ezra  did  in  this  matter,  was  to 
get  together  as  many  copies  of  the  sacred  writings  as  he 
could,  and,  out  of  them  all,  set  forth  a  correct  edition  ;  in 
the  performance  of  which  he  took  care  of  these  following 
particulars  : 

I.  He  corrected  all  the  errors  that  had  crept  into  these 
copies  through  the  negligence  or  mistakes  of  transcribers  ; 
for,  by  comparing  them  one  with  the  other,  he  found  out  the 
true  reading,  and  set  all  at  rights.  Whether  the  Keri  Cetib^' 
that  are  in  our  present  Hebrew  Bibles,  were  of  these  correc- 
tions, 1  durst  not  say ;  the  generality  of  the  Jewish  writers  tell 

u  Daniel  ix.  II,  13.  s  Daniel  is.  2. 

y  The  Keri  Cetib  are  various  readings  iti  the  Hebrew  Bible.  Keri.  signifi- 
oth  that  which  is  read,  and  Ce<t6  that  which  is  written.  For  where  there 
are  any  such  various  readings,  the  wrong  reading  is  written  in  the  text,  (and 
that  is  called  the  Celib,)  and  the  true  reading:  is  written  in  the  marsin,  fnnd 
'hat  is  called  tiie  Keri." 


43'i  lon^kxion  ok  thk  lusTORy  of  [pahi'  u 

as,  that  they  wcrc,^  and  others  among  them  hold  them  much 
ancicnter,  referriuij  them  with  absurdity  enough  even  as  high 
up  as  the  very  times  of  the  first  writers  of  the  books  in  which 
they  are  found,  as  if  they  themselves  had  designedly  made 
these  various  readings  for  the  sake  of  some  mysteries  com- 
prised under  them.  It  is  most  probable,  that  they  had  their 
original  from  the  mistakes  of  the  transcribers  after  the  time 
of  Ezra,  and  the  observations  and  corrections  of  the  Maso- 
rites  made  thereon.  If  any  of  them  were  of  those  ancient 
various  readings  which  had  been  observed  by  Ezra  himself  in 
the  comparing  of  those  copies  he  collated  on  this  occasion, 
and  were  by  him  annexed  in  the  margin,  as  corrections  of 
those  errors  which  he  found  in  the  text;  it  is  certain  those 
could  not  be  of  that  number  which  are  now  in  those  sacred 
books  that  were  written  by  himself,  or  taken  into  the  canon 
after  his  time  :  for  there  are  Keri  Cetihs  in  them,  as  well  as 
in  the  other  books  of  the  fJebrew  Scriptures. 

II.  He  collected  together  all  the  books  of  which  the  holy 
Scriptures  did  then  consist,  and  disposed  them  in  their 
proper  order,  and  settled  the  canon  of  Scripture  for  his  time. 
These  books  he  divided  into  three  parts  ;^  1st.  the  law; 
2dly.  the  prophets;  and  3dly.  the  Cetubim  or  Hagiographa, 
i.  e.  the  holy  writings;  which  division  our  Saviour  himself 
takes  notice  of,  (Luke  xxiv.  44,)  where  he  saith,  "  These 
are  the  words  which  1  spake  unto  you,  while  I  was  yet 
with  you,  that  all  things  might  be  fultilled,  which  are  writ- 
ten in  the  law,  and  in  the  prophets,  and  in  the  psalms  con- 
cerning me."  For  there,  by  the  psalms,  ho  means  the  whole 
third  part,  called  the  Hagiographa  ;  for  that  part  beginning 
with  the  psalms,  the  whole  was  for  that  reason  then  com- 
monly called  by  that  name,  as  usually  with  the  Jews  the  parti- 
cular books  are  named  from  the  words  with  which  they  begin. 
Thus  with  tliem  Genesis  is  called  Bereshith,  Exodus  She- 
moth,  Leviticus  Vajikra,  k.c.  because  they  begin  with  these 
Hebrew  words.  And  Josephus  makes  mention  of  this 
same  division.  For  he  saith,  in  his  tirst  book  against  Apion. 
"  We  have  only  two  and  twenty  books,  which  are  to  be  be- 
lieved as  of  Divine  authority  ;  of  which  five  are  the  books 
of  Moses.  From  the  death  of  Moses  to  the  reign  of  Arla- 
xerxes  the  son  of  Xerxes  king  of  Persia,  the  Prophets  who 
were  the  successors  of  Moses,  have  written  in  thirteen  books. 
The    remaining   four   books    contain   hymns    to    God,  and 

7,  De  Keri  Cetib  vide  Arcanum  Pnncfationis  Revelatum,  lib.  1,  c.  7.  Bux- 
lorfii  Vindicias  Veritatis  Hebraica,-,  part  2,  c.  4,  el  Walloni  Prelogom.  8,  sec. 
18,  19,&c. 

a  Buxtorfii  Tiberias,  c.  11.  Schickardi  Bechinath  Happerushim,  c.  1,  sec. 
6.  Elias  I.evita  in  IMasoreth  Hamrnasorelli.  l,en>^doni  I'npfatio  ad  Bi[)ti:». 
Aliiiif. 


KOOK  V.J  THE  0L1>  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  4'Sb 

documents  of  life  for  the  use  of  men."     In  which  division, 
according    to    him,    the  law  contains,    J.  Genesis,  2.  Ex- 
odus, 3.  Leviticus,  4.  Numbers,  5.  Deuteronomy  :  the  wri- 
tings   of  the    prophets,    1.  Joshua,  2.  Judges,  with   Ruth, 
3.  Samuel,  4.  Kings,  5.  Isaiah,  6.  Jeremiah,  with  his  La- 
mentations,   7.  Ezekiel,    8.  Daniel,    9.  the    twelve    minor 
prophets,   10.  Job,   11.  Ezra,    12.  JSehcmiah,  13.   Esther; 
and  the  Hagiographa,   1.  the  Psalms,  2.  the  Proverbs,  3. 
Ecclesiastes,  4.  the  Song  of  Solomon  ;  which  altogether  make 
twenty-two   books.     This  division  was   made  for  the    sake 
of  reducing  the  books  to  the  number  of  their  alphabet,  in 
which  are  twenty-two  letters.^    But  at  present*^  they  reckon 
these  books  to  be  twenty-four,  and  dispose   of  them  in  this 
order;   1st.  the  law,  which  contains,  1.  Genesis,  2.  Exodus, 
3.  Leviticus,  4.  Numbers,  5.  Deuteronomy;  2dly,  the  wri- 
tings of  the  prophets,  which  they  divide  into  the  former  pro- 
phets and  the  latter  prophets ;  the  books  of  the   former  pro- 
phets are,  6.  Joshua,  7.  Judges,  8.  Samuel,  9.  Kings ;  and 
the  books  of  the  latter  prophets  are,  10.  Isaiah,  11.  Jeremiah, 
12.  Ezekiel,  and,   13.  the  twelve  minor  prophets  ;  3dly,  the 
Hagiographa,  which  arc,    14.  the  Psalms,  15.  the  Proverbs, 
1G.    Job,    17.  the  Song    of   Solomon,  which  they  call  the 
Song  of  Songs,   10.  Ruth,   19.  the  Lamentations,  20.  Ecclesi- 
astes, 21.  Esther,  22.  Daniel,  23.  Ezra,  and  24.  the  Chro- 
nicles.    Under  the  name   of   Ezra,   they  comprehend  the 
book  of  Nehemiah  :  for  the  Hebrews,  and  also  the  Greeks, 
anciently  reckoned  Ezra   and  Nehemiah  but  as  one  book. 
But  this  order  hath  not   been  always  observed   among  the 
,  Jews ;  neither  is  it  now  in   all  places :  for  there  hath  been 
great  variety  as  to  this,  and  that  not  only  among  the  Jews, 
but  also  among  the  Christians,  as  well  Greeks    as  Latins. 
But  no  variation  herein  is  of  any  moment :  for  in  what  order 
soever  the  books  are  placed,  they  are  still  the  word  of  God, 
and  no  change  as  to  this  can  make  any  change  in  that  di- 
vine authority  which  is  stamped  upon  them.     But  all  these 
books  were  not  received  into  the  canon  of  the   Holy  Scrip- 
tures in  Ezra's  time  :  for  Malachi,  it  is  supposed,  lived  after 
him  ;  and,  in  Nehemiah,  mention  is  made  of  Jaddua  as  high- 
priest,  and  of  Darius  Codomannus  as  king  of  Persia,  who  were 
at  least  one  hundred  years  after  his  time  ;  and  in  the  third 
chapter  of  the  first  book  of  Chronicles,  the  genealogy  of 
the  sons  of  Zerubbabel  is  carried  down  for  so  many  genera- 
tions, as  must  necessarily  make  it  reach  to  the  time  of  Alex- 

b  Hieronymus  in  Prologo  Galeato. 

c  Buxtorfii  Tiberias,  c.  11.     Schickaidi  Becliinath  Happerushira,  r.  1,  sec. 
fi.     Leusdeni  Pra;fatio  ad  Bibiia  Ha?I)i'a;a  Atliiaj. 

i\  Vide  IToditirn  de  Bihlioriim  'rp\tif.>iis  Oriu:inalibu.?. 


43G  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV   (JiF  [I'ART   1. 

auder  the  Great ;  and  therefore  this  book  could  not  be  put 
into  the  canon  till  after  his   time.     It  is   most  iikcl}',  that 
the    two   books  of  Chronicles,   Ezra,    Nchemiah,   and    Es- 
ther, as  well  as  Malachi,  were  afterward  added  in  the  time 
of  Simon  the  Just,  and  that  it  was  not  till   then  that  the 
Jewish   canon  of  the  holy  Scriptures  w^as  fully  completed. 
And  indeed  these  last  books  seem   very  much  to  want  the 
exactness  and  skill  of  Ezra  in  their  publication,  they  falling 
far  short  of  the  correctness  which  is  in  the  other  parts  of 
the  Hebrew    Scriptures.     The  five  books  of  the    law  are 
divided  into  fifty-four  sections.®     This  division  many  of  the 
Jews  hold    to  be   one    of  the  constitutions  of  Moses  from 
Mount  Sinai.     But  others,  with  more  likelihood  of   truth, 
attribute  it  to  Ezra.     It  was  made  for  the  use  of  their  syna- 
gogues, and  the  better  instructing  of  the  people  there  in  the 
law  of  God  ;  for  every  sabbath-day  one  of  these  sections  was 
read  in  their  synagogues. "^     And  this,  we  are  assured,  in  the 
Acts  of  the  Apostles,  was  done  among  them  of  old  lime,^ 
which  may  well  be  interpreted  from  the  time  of  Ezra.  They 
ended  the   last  section  with  the  last  words  of  Deuteronomy 
on  the  sabbath  of  the  feast  of  tabernacles,  and  then    began 
anew  with  the  lirst  section,  from  the  beginning  of  Genesis, 
the  next  Sabbath  after,  and  so  went  around  in  this  circle  every 
year.     The  number  of  these  sections  was  fifty-four,  because, 
in  their    intercalated   years  (a  month  .being   then   added,) 
there  were  fifty-four  sabbaths.  On  other  years  they  reduced 
them  to  the  number  of  the  sabbaths  which  were  in  those 
years,  by  joining  two  short  ones  several  times  into  one  ;  for 
they  held  themselves  obliged  to  have  the  whole  law  thus  read 
over  in  their  synagogues  every  year.     Till  the  time  of  the 
persecution  of  Antiochus  Epiphanes,  they  read  only  the  law. 
But  then  being  forbid  to  read  it   any  more,    in  the  room  of 
the  fifty- four  sections  of  the  law,   they  substituted   fifty-four 
sections  out  of  the  prophets,  the  reading  of  which  they  ever 
after  continued.**     So  that,  when  the  reading  of  the  law  was 
again   restored   by   the  Maccabees,   the  section   which  was 
read  every  sabbath  out  of  the  law  served  for  their  first  lesson, 
and  the  section  out  of  the  prophets  for  their  second  lesson  : 
and  so  it  was  practised  in  the  time  of  the  apostles.     And 
therefore  when  I'aul  entered  into  the  synagogue  at  Antio- 
chia  in  Pisidia,  it  is  said,  that  "he  stood  up  to  preach,  aftei- 
the  reading  of  the  law  and  the   prophets  ;'"  that  is,  after 

e  Buxtorfii  Tiberias,  c.  II.  &.  Tract,  de  Parashis  h  Synagoga  Judaica,  c. 
16,  Si  c.  27.  Schickardi  Bechinath  Happerushim,  c.  1,  sec.  G.  Pra?fatio 
Lpusdeni  ad  Bihiia  Hehraa  .4(1113?.     Elias  in  Tisbite. 

f  Buxtorfii  Synagoga  Judaica,  c.  16.  g  Acts  xv.  21. 

ii  Elias  ill  Tisbite.  Buxtorfins  fc  ?chickardus,  ibid.  Hottingeri  The?an- 
iTi.-.  iih.  I.  c  2.  ?Pf  .'».  N  S.  i   Acts  xiii.  15. 


JiOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW    TESTAMENTS.  437 

the  reading  of  the  first  lesson  out  of  the  law,  and  the  second 
lesson  out  of  the  prophets.  And  in  that  very  sermon  which 
he  then  preached,  he  tells  them,  "'  that  the  prophets  were 
read  at  Jerusalem  every  sabbath-day,'"'  that  is,  in  those 
lessons  which  were  taken  out  of  the  prophets. 

These  sections  were  divided  into  verses,  which  the  Jews 
call  Pesukini.  They  are  marked  out  in  the  Hebrew  Bibles 
by  two  great  points  at  the  end  of  them,  called  from  hence 
Soph-Pasuk,  i.  e.  The  end  of  the  verse.  If  Ezra  himself 
was  not  the  author  of  this  division  (as  most  say,)  it  was  not 
long  after  him  that  it  was  introduced  ;  for  certainly  it  is  very 
ancient.  It  is  most  likely  it  was  inveuted  for  the  sake  of  the 
Targumists  or  Chaldee  interpreters.  For,  after  the  Hebrew 
language  had  ceased  to  be  the  mother  tongue  of  the  Jews, 
and  the  Chaldee  grew  up  into  use  among  them  instead  of  it, 
(as  was  their  case  after  their  return  from  the  Babylonish 
captivity,')  their  usage  was,"^  that,  in  the  public  reading  of 
the  law  to  the  people,  it  was  read  to  them,  tirst  in  the  origi- 
nal Hebrew,  and  after  that  rendered  by  an  interpreter  into 
the  Chaldee  language,  that  so  all  might  fully  understand  the 
same.  And  this  was  done  period  by  period.  And  therefore 
that  these  periods  might  be  the  better  distinguished,  and  the 
reader  more  certainly  know  how  much  to  read  at  every  in- 
terval, and  the  interpreter  how  mucli  to  interpret  at  every 
interval,  there  was  a  necessity  that  some  marks  should  be 
invented  for  their  direction  herein.  The  rule  given  in  their 
ancient  books  is,"  that  in  the  law  the  reader  was  to  read  one 
verse,  and  then  the  interpreter  was  to  render  the  same  into 
the  Chaldee  :  but  that  in  the  prophets,  the  reader  was  to 
read  three  verses  together,  and  then  the  interpreter  to  render 
the  same  three  verses  into  Chaldee  in  the  same  manner: 
which  manifestly  proves,  that  the  division  of  the  Scriptures 
into  verses  must  be  as  ancient,  as  the  way  of  interpreting 
them  into  the  Chaldee  language  in  their  synagogues;  which 
was  Irom  the  very  time  that  synagogues  were  erected,  and 
the  Scriptures  publicly  read  in  them  after  the  Babylonish 
captivity.  This  was  at  tirst  done  only  in  the  law,  (for  til! 
the  time  of  the  Maccabees  the  law  only  was  read  in  their 
synagogues ;)"  but  afterward,  in  imitation  hereof,  the   same 

k  Acts  xiii.  27. 

1  David  Kirachi  in  Praefatione  ad  Michlol.  Ephodaei  Gram.  c.  7.  Elias 
Levita  in  Prajfatione  ad  Methurgemaii. 

m  Wallone  Proh-goni.  3,  sec.  24.  Lightfoot,  vol.  i.  p.  215,  220,  357,  1012. 
vol.  ii.  545,  803.  Buxtorlii  Dissertatio  de  Linguaj  Hebreae  Conservatione, 
p.  197.  Moriiii  Exercit.  Bibl.  p.  2,  exerc.  9,  c.  5,  sec.  9.  Hottingeri  The- 
saurus, lib.  1,  c.  3,  sec.  3,  Q.  1.  Mair.ioiiides  in  Tephillin,  c.  12.  Shickardi 
Bechinath  Happerusliim,  c.  2,  sec.  1. 

n  Mishnah  in  Tract.  Megilla,  c.  4.    Tract.  Sopherim.  c  11 

o  Biixlorfius  in  Ribliolhet'a  Kabhinira.p.  2R^< 


43o  OONNKXIOX  OF  THE  HISTORV  OF  [PAUT   I. 

was  also  done  in  the  prophets,  and  the  Hagiographa,  espe- 
cially after  that  the  prophets  began  also  to  be  pubHcly  read 
among  them  as  well  as  the  law  ;  and  from  hence  the  division 
of  the  holy  Scriptures  into  verses,  it  is  most  likely,  was  first 
made,  but  without  any  numerical  figures  annexed  to  them. 
The  manner  whereby  they   are  now  distinguished  in  their 
common    Hebrew   Bibles,  is  by  the  two  great  points,  called 
Soph-Pasuk.  above  mentioned.     But  whether  this  was  the 
ancient  way,  is  by  some  made  a  question.     The  objection 
raised  against  it  is  this  :  If  the  distinction  of  verses  was  in- 
troduced for  the  sake  of  the  Chaldee  interpreters  in  their 
synagogues,  and  must  therefore  be  held  as  ancient  as  that 
way  of  interpreting  the  Scriptures  in  them.P  it  must  then 
have  place  in  their  sacred  synagogical  books  ;  for  none  other 
were  used  either  by  the  readers  or  their  interpreters  in  their 
public  assemblies.     But  it  hath  been  anciently  held  as  a  rule 
among  them,  that  any  points  or  accents  written  into  these 
sacred  books  pollute  and  profane  them  ]^  and  therefore  no 
copy  either  of  the  law  or  the  prophets  now  used  in   their 
synagogues,  hath  any  points  or  accents  written  in  it.     To  this 
I  answer,  whatever  may  be  the  practice  of  the  modern  Jews, 
this  is  no  rule  to  let  us  know  what  was  the  ancient  practice 
among  them;    since,  in   many  particulars,  they  have  varied 
from  the  ancient  usages,  as  they  now  do  from  each  other,  ac- 
cording to  the  different  parts  of  the  world  in  which  they  dwell. 
The  division  of  the  law  and  the  prophets  into  verses,  among 
the  Jews,  is  certainly  very  ancient;  for  mention  of  them  is 
made  in  the  Mishna  ;^  and  (hat  the  reason  of  this  division  was 
for  the  direction  of  the  readers  and  the  Chaldee  interpreters, 
is  also  there  implied.  And  therefore,  supposing  such  a  division 
for  this  use,  it  must  necessarily  follow,  that  there  must  have 
been  some  marks  to  set  it  out,  otherwise  it  could  not  have  an- 
swered the   end    intended.     Those    that   say   these    verses 
were  distinguished  by  a  set  number  of  lines  of  which  they 
consisted,  seem   not  to   have   considered,  that  a  line  often 
ends  in  an  imperfect  sense,  and  in  the  middle  of  a  sentence.' 
And  therefore  a  division  into  verses  this  way  could  not  serve 
the  end  for  which  the  Mishna  makes  mention  of  them,  that 
is,  for  the  direction  of  the  readers  and  Chaldee  interpreters 
in  their  synagogues;    for  there  could  be  no  true  reading  or 
true  interpreting,  if  the  stop  were  made  otherwise  than  at 

p  Morinus  in  Esercitationibus  Biblicis,  part  2,  exercit.  15,  c.  1.  sec.  9. 

q  Tract.  Sopherim,  c.  3.     Morini  Exercit.  Bibl.  part  2,  exercit  15,  c.  4. 

r  Tract.  Megilia,  c.  4,  sec.  4,  ubi  dicitur,  '  Qui  legit  in  lege  non  legit  minus 
quam  tres  versus.  JSon  legit  interpret!  plus  quam  unura  ver.sum,  ii  in  pro- 
phetis  tres.' 

3  Morinus  in  Esercitationibus  Biblicis,  part  2.  exercit.  15.  c.  2 


JiO»K  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  439 

the  end  of  a  full  sentence.  And  therefore,  if  the  distinction 
of  verses  in  their  sacred  synagogical  books  were  anciently 
discernible  only  by  lines,  it  could  be  no  otherwise  according 
to  the  manner  in  which  Mai(nonidt'S  says  they  were  written, 
than  by  ending  of  the  last  line  of  the  verse  in  a  break.  For 
that  author,*  out  of  the  Talmud,  tells  us.  that  the  parchments, 
on  which  they  were  written,  were  to  be  of  six  hands'  breadth, 
and  of  as  many  in  length,  and  the  writing  of  them  to  be  in  six 
columns,  each  column  being  of  an  hand's  breadth  ;  and  that 
each  line  in  these  columns  was  to  contain  thirty  of  their 
letters.  And  therefore,  if  a  break  were  made  where  the 
last  line  of  the  verse  ended,  and  the  next  ver-^e  were  begun 
with  a  new  line,  this  would,  I  acknowledge,  be  sufficient  to 
set  out  the  distinction  of  these  verses,  and  make  them  fully 
answer  the  end  intended.  But  there  arc  two  exceptions 
against  it.  The  first  is,  that  such  breaks  could  not  always  be 
made,  because  sometimes  the  verse  might  be  run  out  to  the 
end  of  the  last  line,  and  so  leave  no  space  at  all  for  a  break ; 
and  then  there  could  no  distinction  at  all  be  made  this  way 
between  that  verse  and  the  next.  And  the  second  is,"  that 
those  who  hold  this  opinion,  that  the  verses  were  to  be 
reckoned  by  lines,  allow  only  two  of  the  lines  above  men- 
tioned to  a  verse  :  but  there  are  many  verses  which  cannot 
be  written  in  fewer  than  five  or  six  of  those  lines.  It  is 
most  likely,  that  anciently  the  writing  of  those  books  was 
in  long  lines  from  one  side  of  the  parchment  to  the  other, 
and  that  the  verses  in  them  were  distinguished  in  the  same 
manner  as  the  Stichi  afterward  were  in  the  Greek  Bibles. 
For  the  manner  of  their  writing  those  Stichi  at  first  was,  to 
allow  a  line  to  every  Stichus,  and  there  to  end  the  writing 
where  they  ended  the  Stichus,  leaving  the  rest  of  the  line 
void,  in  the  same  manner  as  a  line  is  left  at  a  break.''  But 
this  losing  too  much  of  the  parchment,  and  making  the  book 
too  bulky,  for  the  avoiding  of  both  these  inconveniences, 
the  way  afterward  was,  to  put  a  point  at  the  end  of  every 
Stichus,  and  so  continue  the  writing,  without  leaving  any 
part  of  the  line  void  as  before.  And,  in  the  same  manner  I 
conceive  the  Pesukim  or  verses  of  the  Hebrew  Bibles  were 
anciently  written.  At  first  they  allowed  a  line  to  every 
verse  ;  and  a  line  drawn  from  one  side  of  the  parchment  to 
the  other,  of  the  length  as  above  mentioned,  was  sufficient 
to  contain  any  verse  that  is  now  in  the  Hebrew  Bible.  But 
many  verses  falling  short  of  this  length,  they  found  the  same 
inconveniences  that  the  Greeks  after  did  in  the  first  way  of 

t  Maimonides  de  Libro  Legis.  c.  7  fc  9.    Talmud  ia  Bava  Batlira;  M.  16 

u  Morinus,  ibid. 

V  Vide  Millii  Prolegomena  ad  Gr.Tfum  'i'estament,  p.  90. 


440  UONNEXION  OF  THK   HISTORY  OF  [I'ART   I. 

their  writing  their  Stichi ;  and  therefore  came  to  the  same 
remedy,  that  is,  they  did  put  the  two  points  above  mention- 
ed (which  they  call  Soph-Pasiik)  at  the  place  where  the  for- 
mer verse  ended,  and  continued  the  writing  of  the  next  verse 
in  the  same  line  without  leaving  any  void  space  at  all  therein. 
And  so  their  manner  hath  continued  ever  since,  excepting 
only  that  between  their  sections,  as  well  the  smaller  as  the 
greater,  there  is  some  void  space  left  to  make  the  distinc- 
tion between  them.  And  I  am  (he  more  inclined  to  think 
this  to  be  the  truth  of  the  matter,  that  is,  that  anciently  the 
verses  of  the  Hebrew  Bible  were  so  many  lines  therein,  be- 
cause among  the  ancients  of  other  nations,  about  the  same 
time,  the  lines  in  the  writings  of  prose  authors,  as  well  as  of 
poets,  were  termed  verses  ;  and  hence  it  is  that  we  are  told 
that  Zoroastres's  works  contained  two  millions  of  verses,^ 
and  Aristotle's  four  hundred  and  forty-five  thousand  two 
hundred  and  seventy,'^  though  neither  of  them  wrote  any 
thing  but  in  prose  ;  and  so  also  we  find  the  writings  of  Tully,' 
of  Origen,''  of  Lactantius,*^  and  others,*^  who  were  all  prose 
writers,  reckoned  by  the  number  of  verses,  which  could  be 
no  other  than  so  many  lines.  And  why  then  might  not  the 
Bible  verses  anciently  have  been  of  the  same  nature  also  ? 
1  mean  when  written  in  long  lines  as  aforesaid.  But  the 
long  lines  often  occasioning,  that  in  reading  to  the  end  of 
one  verse,  they  lost  the  beginning  of  the  next,  and  so  often 
did  read  wrong,  either  by  skipping  a  line,  or  beginning  the 
same  again ;  for  the  avoiding  of  this,  they  came  to  the 
way  of  writing  in  columns  and  in  short  lines, ^  as  is  above 
mentioned.  But  all  this  I  mean  of  their  sacred  synagogical 
books.     In  their  common  Bibles,  they  are  not  tied  up  to 

y  Plin.  lib.  3,  c.  1.  7.  Diogenes  Laertius  in  Vita  Aristotelis. 

a  Asconius  Pedianus  Ciceronis  verba  citat,  vtrsu  a  prima  oclingtnlisinw 
</uinquagesimo,  k.c. 

h  Hieronyraus  in  Cataiogo  Sciiptorum  Ecclesiasticorum, et  alibi. 

c  Hieronymus  in  Epistola  124  ad  Damasum. 

d  Cornelias  ^'epos  in  Epaminonda.  '  In  hoc  volumine  vitas  excelleutium 
virorum  complurium  conciudere  constituimus,  quorum  separatim  multis  mil- 
libus  versuum  compUires  scriptores  ante  nos  explicarunt.'  And  Josephus 
tells  us  in  the  conclusion  of  his  Antiquities,  '  That  this  work  of  his  contain- 
ed twenty  books,  and  sixty  thousand  Ti%ot  or  verses.'  For  the  Greek  r/%o;  is 
tiie  same  with  tiie  Latin  verses,  and  both  the  same  originally  with  what  we 
call  a  line  in  writing.  For  verse  properly  is  a  line,  whether  in  prose  or 
verse,  and  is  so  called  a  rerlendo,  because  the  writer,  when  he  is  got  to  the 
end  of  one  line,  turns  back  his  hand,  and  begins  the  next,  and  so  doth  the 
reader  also  his  eye,  from  the  end  of  one  line  to  the  beginning  of  the  next. 
Vide  Menagii  Observationes  in  Diogenis  Laertii,  lib.  4,  No.  24.  Jerome 
also,  in  bis  preface  before  his  Latin  version  of  the  book  of  Daniel,  saith,  that 
Methodius,  Eusebius.  and  Apollinarius,  answered  the  objections  of  Porphy- 
ry against  the  Scriptures,  multis  versuum  millibus,  i.  e.  by  many  tliottsands  nf 
^'erses,  that  is,  lines  ;  for  they  all  wrote  in  pro.=p. 

"  Maimonides  in  T.ibro  ]^eKi.=.  c.T 


JiOOK  V.j  THE  OLD  ANW  NEW  TE>TAMEN'fS.  44i 

such  rules,  but  write  and  print  them  so  as  they  may  best 
serve  for  their  instruction  and  convenience  in  common  use. 
If  the  Jews  at  present,  in  their  syna^ogical  books,  leave  out 
the  two  points  Soph-Pasuk  at  the  end  of  the  verses,  it  pro- 
ceeds from  their  wresting  the  rule  above  mentioned,  against 
putting  points  or  accents  into  their  sacred  books,  to  a  too 
rigorous  meaning  ;  for  by  those  points  therein  mentioned, 
seem  to  be  understood  no  other  points  than  the  vowel  points, 
and  such  otiier  as  affect  the  text  in  the  reading.  But  these  two 
points  at  the  end  of  every  verse  only  terminate  the  period, 
without  affecting  at  all  either  the  words  or  the  letters.  But 
it  is  no  new  thing  for  the  Jews,  out  of  an  over  superstitious 
interpretation  of  their  traditions,  to  make  innovations  in 
their  ancient  usages,  especially  while  they  had  their  schools 
and  universities  in  Mesopotamia,*^  and  there  held  their  syne- 
drial  and  consistorial  assemblies  of  their  Rabbis,  in  which 
they  hammered  tlieir  law,  and  also  their  ancient  traditions 
by  a  vast  number  of  new  constitutions  and  new  determina- 
tions, into  what  form  they  pleased. 

But  the  division  of  the  holy  Scriptures  into  chapters  as 
we  now  have  them,  is  of  a  much  later  date.  The  Psalms 
indeed  were  always  divided  as  at  present  :  for  St.  Paul,  in 
his  sermon  at  Antioch  in  Pisidia,  quotes  the  second  Psalm. s 
But,  as  to  the  rest  of  the  holy  Scriptures,  the  division  of 
them  into  such  chapters  as  at  present,  is  what  the  ancients- 
knew  nothing  of.''  Some  attribute  it  to  Stephen  Langton,* 
who  was  archbishop  of  Canterbury  in  the  reigns  of  king 
John,  and  king  Henry  III.  his  son.  But  the  true  author  of 
this  invention  was  Hugo  de  Sancto  Caro,  who  being  from  a 
Dominican  monk  advanced  to  the  dignity  of  a  cardinal, 
and  the  first  of  that  order  that  was  so,  is  commonly  called 
Hugo  Cardinalis.  The  whole  occasion  and  history  of  this 
matter,  and  the  progress  of  it  to  the  state  it  is  now  in,  is  as 
followeth  : 

This  Cardinal  Hugo,''  who  flourished  about  the  year  1240, 

f  They  had  these  schools  at  Naerda,  Sora,  and  Pombeditha  in  Mesopota- 
mia, till  about  the  year  of  our  Lord  1040,  when  they  were  driven  out  tbence 
by  the  Mahometan  princes  that  reigned  in  those  parts. 

g  Acts  xiii.  33. 

h  The  Greek  Bibles  among  Christians  anciently  had  their  titkoi  and 
»i^AKUM  ;  but  the  intent  of  them  was  rather  to  point  out  the  sum  or  contents 
of  the  text,  than  to  divide  the  books;  and  they  were  vastly  different  from 
the  present  chapters  ;  for  many  of  them  contained  only  a  very  few  verses, 
and  some  of  them  no  more  than  one. 

i  Balffius  cent.  3,  p.  275. 

k  Buitorfii  Praefatio  ad  Concordantias  Bibliorum  Hebraicaa.  Morinas  in 
Exercit.  Bibl.  part  2,  exercit.  17,  c.  3.  Gerebradius  in  Chronicoad  Annans 
Christi  1244.  Sixtus  Senensis  Bibliothec.  lib.  3.  Hottingeri  Thesaaras.. 
lib.  3,  c.  2,  sec.  5.     Capelli  Arcanum  Punctationis,  lib.  2,  c.  17,  sec.  8, 

Vol.  L  bd 


442^  CONNESIOxV  OF  THE   HISTORY  OF  [I'AK'f    I. 

and  died  in  the  year  1262,  had  laboured  much  in  the  study 
of  the  holy  Scriptures,  and  made  a  comment  upon  the  whole 
of  them.     The  carrying  on  of  this  work  administered  to  him 
the  occasion  of  inventing  the  first  concordance  that  was 
made  of  the  holy  Scriptures,  that  is,   that  of  the  vulgar  La- 
tin Bible.     For,  conceiving  that  such  an  index  of   all  the 
words  and  phrases  in  the  holy  Scriptures  would  be  of  great 
use  for  the   attaining  of  a  better  understanding  of  them,  he 
projected  a  scheme  for  the  making  of  it ;  and  forthwith  set 
a  great  number  of  the  monks  of  his  order  on  the  collecting 
of   the  words  under  their  proper  classes,  in  every  letter  of 
the  alphabet,  in  order  to  this   design,  and  by  the  help  of  so 
many  hands,  he  soon  brought  it  to  what  he  intended.     This 
work  was  afterward  much  improved  by  those  who  followed 
him,  especially  by  Arlottus  Thuscus,  and  Conradus  Halber- 
stadius,  the  former  a  Franciscan,  and  the  other  a  Dominican 
friar,  who  both  lived  about  the  end  of   the  same  century. 
But  the  whole  end  and  aim  of  the  work  being  for  the  easier 
finding  of  any  word  or  passage  in  the  holy  Scriptures,  to 
make  it  answer  this  purpose,  the  cardinal  found  it  necessary, 
in  the  first  place,  to  divide  the  books  into  sections,  and  the 
sections  into  under  divisions,  that   by   these   he  might  the 
better  make  the  references,  and  the  more  exactly  point  out 
in  the  index  where  every  word  or  passage  might  be  found  in 
the  text.     For  till  then  every  book  of  the  holy  Scriptures, 
in  the  vulgar  Latin  Bibles,  was  without  any  division  at  all ; 
and  therefore  had  the  index  referred  only  to  the  book,  the 
whole  book,  perchance,  must  have  been  read  over,  ere  that 
could  be  found  which  was  sought  for;  but  by  referring  to  it 
by  this  division  and  subdivision,  it  was  immediately  had  at 
first  sight.     And  these  sections   are  the  chapters  which  the 
Bible  hath  ever  since  been  divided  into.    For,  on  the  publish- 
ing of  this  concordance,  the  usefulness  of  it  being  immedi- 
ately discerned,  all  coveted  to  have  it;  and  for  the  sake  of 
the  use  of  it,  all  divided  their  Bibles  in  the  same  manner  as 
Hugo  had  done.  For  the  references  in  the  concordance  being 
made  by  these  chapters,  and  the  subdivisions  of  them,  unless 
their  Bibles  were  so  divided  too,  the  concordance  would  be  of 
no  use  to  them.  And  thus  this  division  of  the  several  books  of 
the  Bible  into  chapters  had  its  original,  which  hath  ever  since 
been  made  use  of  in  all  places,  and  among  all  people,  wher- 
ever the  Bible   itself  is  used  in  these  western  parts  of  the 
world.     But  the   subdivision  of   the  chapters  was  not  then 
by  verses  as  now.     Hugo's  way  of  subdividing  them  was  by 
the  letters  A.  B.  C.  D.  E.  F.  G.  placed  in  the  margin  at  ao 
equal  distance  from  each  other,  according  as   the  chapters 
were  longer  or  shorter.     In  long  chapters  all  these  seven 


BOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  443 

letters  were  used,  in  others  fewer,  according  as  the  length 
which  the  chapters  were  of  did  require.  For  the  subdivi- 
sion of  chapters  by  verses,  which  is  now  in  all  our  Bibles, 
was  not  introduced  into  them  till  some  ages  after,  and  then 
it  was  from  the  Jews  that  the  use  hereof,  as  now  among  us, 
first  had  its  original  on  this  occasion.  About  the  year  14.30, 
there  lived  here,  among  the  western  Jews,  a  famous  Rabbi, 
called  by  some  Rabbi  Mordccai  Nathan,  by  others  Rabbi 
Isaac  Nathan,'  and  by  many  by  both  these  names,  as  if  he 
were  first  called  by  one  of  them,  and  then  by  a  change  of  it, 
by  the  other.  This  Rabbi  being  much  conversant  with 
the  Christians,  and  having  frequent  disputes  with  their  learn- 
ed men  about  religion,  he  thereby  came  to  the  knowledge  of 
the  great  use  which  they  made  of  the  Latin  concordance 
composed  by  Cardinal  Hugo,  and  the  benefit  which  they  had 
thereby,  in  the  ready  finding  of  any  place  in  the  Scriptures 
that  they  had  occasion  to  consult ;  which  he  was  so  much 
taken  with,  that  he  immediately  set  about  the  making  of 
such  a  concordance  to  the  Hebrew  Bible  for  the  use  of  the 
Jews.  He  began  this  work  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1438, 
and  finished  it  in  the  year  1445  ;  so  that  he  was  just  seven 
years  in  the  composing  of  it.  And  the  first  publishing  of  it, 
happening  about  the  time  that  printing  was  first  invented,""  it 
hath,  since  that  time,  undergone  several  editions  from  the 
press.  That  which  was  printed  at  Basil  by  Buxtorf  the  son, 
anno  1632,  is  the  best  of  them  :  for  Buxtorf  the  father  had 
taken  great  pains  about  it,  to  make  it  more  correct  and  com- 
plete ;  and  Buxtorf  the  son  added  also  his  labours  to  those 
of  his  father,  for  the  perfecting  of  it,  and  published  it,  with 
both  their  improvements,  in  the  year  I  have  mentioned  ; 
and,  by  reason  of  the  advantages  it  hath  received  herefrom. 
it  deservedly  hath  the  reputation  of  being  the  perfectest  and 
best  book  of  its  kind  that  is  extant,  and  indeed  is  so  useful 
for  the  understanding  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures,  that  no  one 
who  employs  his  studies  this  way  can  well  be  without  it,  it 
being  the  best  dictionary,  as  well  as  the  best  concordance  to 
them.  In  the  composing  of  this  book,  Rabbi  Nathan  finding 
it  necessary  to  follow  the  same  division  of  the  Scripture 
into  chapters,  which  Hugo  had  made  in  them,  it  had  the  like 
effects  as  to  the  Hebrew  Bibles,  that  Hugo's  had  as  to  the 
Latin,  that  is,  it  caused  the  same  division  to  be  made  in  all 
the  Hebrew  Bibles,  which  were  afterward  either  written  out 
or  printed  for  common  use.     For  this  concordance  being 

1  Praefatio  Buxtorfii  ad  Concordantias  Bibliorum  Hebraicas.  Morinus 
Exercit.  Bibl.  part  2,  exercit.  17,  c.  3. 

m  Printing  was  first  invented  at  Mentz,  in  Germany,  by  John  Faust,  and 
John  Gutenberg,  A.  D.  1440.  See  Calvisius  under  that  year,  and  Pancirol' 
lus  with  Salmuth  on  liim,  part  2,  tit.  12. 


444  rOXiVEXrOV  of  THi2  HISTORY   OF  [}'AR1    I. 

found  of  excellent  use  annong  those  for  whom  it  was  made, 
they  were  forced  to  comply  with  this  division  for  the  sake  of 
having  the  benefit  of  it.  For  the  references  in  Nathan's 
concordance  being  every  where  by  chapters  according  to 
Hugo's  division,  they  could  no  otherwise  have  the  benefit  of 
finding  in  their  Bibles  the  places  referred  to,  than  by  divi- 
ding them  in  the  same  chapters  also.  And  from  hence  the 
division  of  the  scriptural  books  into  chapters  first  came  into 
the  Hebrew  Bibles.  But  Nathan,  thouuh  he  followed  Hugo 
in  the  division  of  the  scriptural  books  into  chapters,  yet  did 
not  so  in  the  division  of  the  chapters  by  the  letters  A.  B. 
C.  (fee.  in  the  margin,  but  refined  upon  him  in  this  matter  by 
introducing  a  better  usage,  that  is,  by  using  the  division 
which  was  made  by  verses.  This  division,  I  have  shown,  was 
very  ancient;  but  it  was  till  now  without  any  numbers  put  to 
the  verses.  This  was  first  done  by  Rabbi  Nathan  for  the  sake 
of  his  concordance:  for  therein  all  his  references  being  by  the 
chapters  and  verses,  as  there  was  a  necessity  that  those  who 
used  this  concordance  should  have  their  Bibles  thus  divided 
into  chapters  and  verses  also;  so  was  it  that  both  should  be 
numbered  in  them.  For  it  was  by  the  numbers  of  the 
chapters  and  verses  that  they  were  to  find  the  places  souglit 
for,  in  the  same  manner  as  is  now  practised  in  our  English 
concordances;  as  iti  Newman's,  which  is  by  much  the  best  and 
perfectest  of  all  ihat  are  extant.  The  numbering,  therefore, 
of  the  verses  in  the  chapters,  and  the  quoting  of  the  pas- 
sages in  every  chapter,  by  the  verses,  instead  of  doing  it  by 
letters  at  an  equal  distance  in  the  margin,  was  Nathan's  in- 
vention ;  in  all  things  else  he  followed  the  pattern  which 
Hugo  had  set  him.  But  it  is  to  be  observed,  that  he  did  not 
number  the  verses  any  otherwise  than  by  affixing  the  nume- 
rical letters  in  the  margin  at  every  fifth  verse.  And  this 
liath  been  the  usage  of  the  Jews  in  all  their  Hebrew  Bibles 
ever  since,  till  of  late  Athias,  a  Jew  of  Amsterdam,  in  his 
two  fair  and  correct  editions  of  the  Hebrew  Bible  printed 
by  him  in  that  city,  the  first  in  the  year  1661,  and  the  other 
in  the  year  1667,  hath  varied  herefrom  in  two  particulars. 
For,  1st,  he  hath  introduced  into  these  editions  the  use  of 
the  Indian  figures:  and,  2dly,  hath  placed  them  at  every 
verse,  where  the  numerical  Hebrew  letters  are  not;  so  that 
continuing  the  numerical  Hebrew  letters  as  formerly,  at 
every  fifth  verse,  he  had  put  the  Indian  figures  at  all  the 
rest.  Before  this  we  were  to  number  from  every  fifth  verse 
to  find  any  intermediate  verse  between  that  and  the  next 
fifth.  AVhether  the  Jews  will  follow  this  new  way  in  their 
future  editions,  I  know  not;  but  this  I  know,  that  this 
second  edition  of  Athias's  Hebrew  Bible  is  the  most  correct 


«00K  v.]      THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  445 

as  well  as  the  most  convenient  and  best  fitted  for  use,  of  any 
that  have  been  as  yet  set  forth.  After  Rabbi  Nathan  had 
brought  in  this  use  of  nuuiberitig  the  verses,  and  quoting  by 
them  what  was  in  every  chapter,  this  soon  appeared  to  be  a 
much  better  way,  than  the  tjuoting  of  what  is  in  them  by  the 
letters  A.  B.  C.  &c.  set  in  the  margin.  And  therefore  Va- 
tablus  having,  from  this  pattern,  pubhshed  a  Latin  Bible, 
with  the  chapters  so  divided  into  verses,  and  the  versos  so 
numbered,  this  example  hath  been  followed  in  all  other 
editions  that  have  been  since  set  forth."  And  all  that  have 
published  concordances,  as  well  as  all  other  writers,  have 
ever  since  that  time  quoted  the  Scriptures  by  the  number  of 
chapters  and  verses  according  to  this  division.  So  that,  as 
the  Jews  borrowed  the  division  of  the  books  of  the  holy 
Scriptures  into  chapters  from  the  Christians,  in  like  manner 
the  Christians  borrowed  that  of  the  chapters  into  verses 
from  the  Jews.  And  thus  they  have  helped  each  other  to 
make  the  present  editions  of  the  Bible  much  more  conve- 
nient for  common  use  than  otherwise  they  would  have  been. 
And  Robert  Stephanus,  taking  a  hint  from  hence,  made  a 
like  division  of  the  chapters  of  the  New  Testament  into 
verses  also,  and  for  the  same  reason  as  Rabbi  Nathan  had 
done  so  before  him  as  to  the  Old  Testament,  that  is,  for  the 
sake  of  a  concordance,  which  he  was  then  composing  for 
the  Greek  Testament,  and  which  was  afterward  printed  by 
Henry  Stephanus  his  son,  who  gives  this  account  hereof  in 
his  preface  to  that  concordance.  Since  that,  this  division  of 
the  holy  Scriptures  by  chapters  and  verses,  and  the  quoting 
of  all  passages  in  them  by  the  numbers  of  both,  hath  grown 
into  use  every  where  among  us  in  these  western  parts  ;  so 
that,  not  only  all  Latin  Bibles,  but  all  Greek  Bibles  also, 
and  all  others  that  have  been  printed  in  any  of  the  modern 
languages,  have  followed  this  division.  And  the  usefulness 
of  it  from  the  tirst  time  it  was  introduced,  reconciled  all  men 
thereto.  And  thus  that  division  of  the  holy  Scriptures  into 
chapters  and  verses,  which  is  now  every  where  in  use  had  its 
<5riginal. 

III.  The  third  thing  which  Ezra  did  about  the  holy  Scrip- 
tures, in  his  edition  of  them.  Vt^as,  he  added,  in  several  places, 
throughout  the  books  of  this  edition  what  appeared  neces- 
sary for  the  illustrating,  connecting,  or  completing  of  them  ; 
wherein  he  was  assisted  by  the  same  Spirit  by  which  they 
were  at  first  wrote.  Of  this  sort  we  may  reckon  the  last 
chapter  of  Deuteronomy,  which  giving  an  account  of  the 
death  and  burial  of  Moses,  and  of  the  succession  of  Joshua 
after  him :  it  could  not  be  written  by  Moses  himself,  who  un- 

n  Moriniis  in  Exercit.  Biblic  part  2,  exercit.  17,  c.  4,  sec.  2. 


446  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pART  J. 

doubtedly  was  the  penman  of  all  the  rest  of  that  book.  It 
seems  most  probable,  that  it  was  added  by  Ezra  at  this  time. 
And  such  also  may  we  reckon  the  several  interpolations  wliich 
occur  in  many  places  of  the  holy  Scriptures.  For  that  there 
are  such  interpolations,  is  undeniable  ;  there  being  many 
passages  through  the  whole  sacred  writ,  which  create  dillicul- 
ties,  that  can  never  be  solved  without  the  allowing  of  them. 
As  for  instance,  (Genesis  xii.  G.)  it  is  remarked,  on  Abraham's 
coming  into  the  land  of  Caanan,  that  the  Canaanites  were 
then  in  the  land;  which  is  not  likely  to  have  been  said,  till  after 
the  time  of  Moses,  when  the  Canaanites  being  extirpated  by 
Josliua,  were  then  no  more  in  the  land.  And  (Genesis  xxii. 
14,)  we  read,  "  Asit  issaidto  this  day, in  the  mount  of  the  Lord 
itshall  be  seen."  ButMount  Moriah  (which  isthe  mount  there 
spoken  of)  was  not  called  the  mount  of  the  Lord  till  the  tem- 
ple was  built  on  it.  many  hundred  years  after.  And  this  be- 
ing here  spoken  of  it  as  a  proverbial  saying,  that  obtained 
among  the  Israelites  in  after  ages,  the  whole  style  of  the 
text  doth  manifestly  point  at  a  time  after  Moses,  when  they 
were  in  possession  of  the  land  in  which  this  mountain  stood. 
And  therefore  both  these  particulars  prove  the  words  cited 
to  have  been  an  interpolation.  Genesis  xxxvi.  3,  it  is  writ- 
ten ;  "And  these  are  the  kings  that  reigned  in  the  land  of 
Edom,  before  there  reigned  any  king  over  the  land  of  Israel." 
Which  could  not  have  been  said,  till  after  there  had  been  a 
king  in  Israel ;  and  therefore  they  cannot  be  Moses's  words  ; 
but  must  have  been  interpolated  afterward.  Exodus 
xvi.  35,  the  words  of  the  text  are  :  '•  And  the  children  of 
of  Israel  did  eat  manna  forty  years,  till  they  came  to  a  land 
inhabited.  They  did  eat  manna,  till  they  came  unto  the  bor- 
ders of  the  land  of  Canaan."  But  Moses  was  dead  before 
the  manna  ceased  ;  and  therefore  these  cannot  be  his  words, 
but  must  have  been  inserted  afterward.  Deuteronomy  ii. 
12,  it  is  said,  "  The  Horims  also  dwelt  in  Soir  beforetime,  but 
the  children  of  Esau  succeeded  them,  when  they  had  destroy- 
ed them  before  them  and  dwelt  in  their  stead,  as  Israel  did 
unto  the  land  of  his  possession,  which  the  Lord  gave  unto 
them."  Which  could  not  have  been  written  by  Moses,  Is- 
rael having  not  till  after  his  death  entered  into  the  land  of 
his  possession,  which  the  Lord  gave  unto  them.  Deuterono- 
my iii.  11,  it  is  said,  "Only  Og  king  of  Bashan  remained 
of  the  remnant  of  giants  ;  behold,  his  bedstead  was  a  bed- 
stead of  iron.  Is  it  not  in  Rabbath  of  the  children  of  Am- 
mon  ?"  The  whole  style  and  strain  of  which  text,  especial- 
ly that  of  the  last  clause  of  it,  plainly  speaks  it  to  have  been 
written  a  long  while  after  that  king  was  slain  ;  and  therefore 
it  could  not  be  written  by  Moses,  who  died  within  five  months 


BOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AN'D  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  447 

after.  In  the  same  chapter,  verse  14,  it  is  said,  "  Jair,  the  son 
of  Manasseh,  took  all  the  country  of  Argob,  unto  the  coasts 
of  Geshuri  and  Maacathi,  and  called  them  after  his  own  name, 
Bashan-Havoth-Jair,  unto  this  day."  Wliere  the  phrase 
unto  this  day,  speaks  a  much  greater  distance  of  time  after 
the  fact  related,  than  those  iew  months  in  which  Moses  sur- 
vived after  that  conquest  ;  and  therefore  what  is  there  writ- 
ten must  have  been  inserted  by  some  other  hand,  than  that 
of  Moses,  long  after  his  death.  And,  in  the  book  of  Pro- 
verbs (which  was  certainly  king  Solomon's,)  in  the  begin- 
ning of  the  twenty-tifth  chapter  it  is  written,  "  These  are 
the  Proverbs  of  Solomon,  which  the  men  of  Hezekiah  king 
of  Judah  copied  out."  Which  must  certainly  have  been 
added  many  ages  after  Solomon  ;  for  Hezekiah  was  of  the 
twelfth  generation  in  descent  from  him.  Many  more  instan- 
ces of  such  interpolated  passages  might  be  given.  For 
throughout  the  whole  Scriptures  they  have  been  frequently 
cast  in  by  way  of  parenthesis,  where  they  have  appeared 
necessary  for  the  explaining,  connecting,  or  illustrating  the 
text,  or  the  supplying  what  was  wanting  in  it.  But  those 
already  mentioned  are  sufficient  to  prove  the  thing.  Of 
which  interpolations  undoubtedly  Ezra  was  the  author,  in  all 
the  books  which  passed  his  examination,  and  Simon  the  Just 
of  all  the  rest  which  were  added  afterward  ;  for  they  all 
seemed  to  refer  to  those  latter  times.  But  these  additions 
do  not  detract  any  thing  from  the  divine  auihority  of  the 
whole,  because  they  were  all  inserted  by  the  direction  of 
the  same  holy  Spirit  which  dictated  all  the  rest.  This  as 
to  Ezra  is  without  dispute,  he  being  himself  one  of  the  di- 
vine penmen  of  the  holy  Scriptures  ;  for  he  was  most  certain- 
ly the  writer  of  thai  book  in  the  Old  Testament  which  bears 
his  name  5  and  is,  upon  good  grounds,  supposed  to  be  the 
author  of  two  more,  that  is,  o^  the  two  books  of  Chronicles, 
as  perchance  also  he  was  of  the  book  of  Esther.  And,  if  the 
books  written  by  him  be  of  divine  authority,  why  may  not 
every  thing  else  be  so  which  he  hath  added  to  any  of  the  rest, 
since  there  is  all  reason  for  us  to  suppose  that  he  was  as  much 
directed  by  the  holy  Spirit  of  God  in  the  one  as  he  was  in 
the  other?  The  great  importance  of  the  work  proves  the 
thing:  for  as  it  was  necessary  for  the  church  of  God  that 
this  work  should  be  done ;  so  also  was  it  necessary  for  the 
work,  that  the  person  called  thereto  should  be  thus  assisted 
in  the  completing  of  it. 

IV.  He  changed  the  old  names  of  several  places  that  were 
grown  obsolete,  putting,  instead  of  them,  the  new  names  by 
which  they  were  at  that  time  called,  that  the  people  might 
the  better  understand  what  was  written.     Thus  (Genesis  xiv^ 


44i^  CONNEXION  OF  THE   HISTORY    OF  [PART   f. 

I'l.)  Abraham  is  said  to  liave  pursued  the  kings,  who  car- 
ried Lot  away  captive,  as  far  as  Dan  ;  whereas  the  name  of 
that  place  was  Laish,  till  the  Dariites,  long  after  the  death  of 
Moses,  possessed  themselves  of  it,  and  called  it  Dan,  after  the 
name  of  Dan  their  father :"  and  therefore  it  could  not  be 
called  Dan  in  the  original  copy  of  Moses  but  that  name 
must  have  been  put  in  afterward,  it)stead  of  that  of  Laish, 
on  this  review.  And  so  in  several  places  in  Genesis,  and 
also  in  Numbers,  we  tind  mention  made  of  Hebron  ;  where- 
as the  name  of  that  city  was  Kirjath  Arba,  till  Caleb,  having 
obtained  the  possession  of  it  after  the  division  of  the  land, 
called  it  Hebron,  after  the  name  of  Hebron,  one  of  his  sons  ; 
and  therefore  that  name  could  not  be  in  the  \e%{,  till  placed 
there  long  after  the  time  of  Moses,  by  way  of  exchange  for 
that  of  Kirjath  Arba,  which  it  is  not  to  be  doubted  was  done 
at  the  time  of  this  review.  And  many  other  like  examples 
of  this  may  be  given,  whereby  it  appears,  that  the  study  of 
those  who  governed  tiie  church  of  God  in  those  times  was 
to  render  the  Scripture  as  plain  and  intelligible  to  the  peo- 
ple as  they  could,  and  not  to  hide  and  conceal  any  of  it  from 
them. 

V.  He  wrote  out  the  whole  in  the  Chaldee  character. 
For  that  having  now  grown  wholl}  into  use  among  tlie  people 
after  the  Babjionish  captivity,  he  changed  the  old  Hebrew 
character  for  it,  which  hath  since  that  time  been  retained 
only  by  the  Samaritans  ;  among  whom  it  is  preserved  even  to 
this  day.  This  was  the  old  Phoenician  character,  from  which 
the  Greeks  borrowed  theirs.  And  the  old  Ionian  alphabet 
bears  some  similitude  to  it,  as  Scaliger  shows  in  his  notes 
upon  Eusebius's  Chronicon.P  In  this  Moses  and  the  pro- 
phets recorded  the  sacred  oracles  of  God,  and  in  this  tiie 
finger  of  God  himself  wrote  the  ten  commandments  in  the 
two  tables  of  stone.  There  are  some,  I  acknowledge,  who 
strenuously  contend  for  the  antiquity  of  the  present  Hebrew 
letters,  as  if  they,  and  none  other,  had  always  been  the  sa- 
cred character  in  which  the  holy  Scriptures  were  written  ; 
and  that  the  Samaritan  was  never  in  use  for  this  purpose, 
but  only  among  the  Samaritans,  who,  in  opposition  (say  they) 
to  the  Jews,  on  the  rise  of  that  enmity  which  was  between 
them,  wrote  out  the  law  of  I\Joses  (which  is  the  only  Scrip- 
ture they  receive)  in  this  characterdiflferent  from  them.  Were 
we  to  judge  of  sacred  things  by  their  external  beauty,  we 
should  concur  with  this  opinion  :  for  the  Chaldee  character 
is  one  of  the  beautifulest,  and  the  Samaritan  the  uncouthest, 
and  the  most  incapable  of  caligraphy  of  all  that  have  been 

o  Joshua  xix  47.    Judges  xviii.  29, 

p  In  Animadversionibus  ad  Eusebii  Cbronicofljp.  110,  111;  &c 


JiOOK  v.]  IHE  OLD  AKI>  N£W  TCESTAHENVS*  449 

used  among  the  different  nations  of  the  world.  But  the 
opinion  of  the  most  learned  men,  and  upon  good  grounds,  is 
on  the  other  side ;  for  there  are  many  old  Jewish  shekels 
still  in  being,  and  others  of  the  same  sort  are  frequently  dug 
up  in  Judea,  with  this  inscription  on  them  in  Samaritan  let- 
ters, Jerusalem  Kedoshah,  that  is,  Jerusalem  the  Holy  ;'i 
which  inscription  shows,  that  they  could  not  be  the  coin 
either  of  the  Israelites  of  the  ten  tribes,  or  of  the  Samaritans 
who  after  succeeded  them  in  their  land  ;  for  neither  of  them 
would  have  put  the  name  of  Jerusalem  upon  their  coin,  or 
ever  have  called  it  the  holy  city.  These  pieces,  therefore, 
must  have  been  the  coin  of  those  of  the  two  tribes  before 
the  captivity ;  and  this  proves  the  Samaritan  character  to 
be  that  which  was  then  in  use  among  them-  And  it  cannot 
be  said,  that  these  shekels  are  counterfeited  by  modern 
hands:  for  Rabbi  Moses  Ben  Nachman  tells  us  of  several 
which  he  met  with  in  his  time  that  had  this  inscription  upon 
them  in  Samaritan  letters,  who  lived  above  five  hundred 
years  since.  And  therefore  it  must  follow,  that  the  present 
Hebrew  character  was  introduced  among  the  Jews  after  the 
Babylonish  captivity  :  and  the  general  testimony  of  the  an- 
cients is,  that  it  was  Ezra  that  did  first  put  the  holy  Scrip- 
tures into  it,  on  the  review  which  he  made  of  them  on  his 
coming  to  Jerusalem.  Eusebius,""  in  his  Chronicon,  tells  us 
so,  and  St.  Jerome  ^  doth  the  same ;  and  so  do  also  both  the 
Talmuds ;  and  the  generality  of  learned  men,  as  well  among 
the  Jews  as  Christians,  hold  to  this  opinion.  Capellus  hath 
written  a  tract  for  it,  and  Buxtorf  the  son  another  against  it. 
They  who  shall  think  fit  to  read  them,  will  see  all  that  can 
be  said  on  either  side.  But  I  think  the  argument,  which  is 
brought  from  the  shekels,  cannot  be  answered.     But, 

VI.  Whether  Ezra,  on  this  review,  did  add  the  vowel 
points,  which  are  now  in  the  Hebrew  Bibles,  is  a  harder  ques- 
tion to  be  decided.  It  went  without  contradiction  in  the 
affirmative,  till  Elias  Levita,  a  German  Jew,  wrote  against 
it,  about  the  beginning  of  the  Reformation.  Buxtorf  the 
father  endeavoured  to  refute  his  arguments.  But  Capellus, 
a  Protestant  divine  of  the  French  church,  and  professor  of 
Hebrew  in  their  university  at  Saumur,  hath,  in  a  very  elabo- 
rate discourse,  made  a  thorough  reply  to  all  that  can  be  said 
on  this  head,   and  very  strenuously   asserted  the  contrary. 

q  Scaliger  in  Animadversionibus  ad  Eusebii  Chronicon,  p.  117,  col.  2. 
Vossius  de  Arte  Grammatica,  lib.  1,  c.  9.  VVaserus  de  NommisHebraeorum, 
Waltonus  de  Siclorum  Formis  et  in  Prolegom.  3,  sec.  29, 30,  Sic. 

r  Ad  Annum  4740. 

s  In  Praet'atione  ad  l.Regutu.  et  in  Comraeot.  in  E2ekieleni,c.  9 

Vol.  [.  P>7 


450  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OT  [PAKT  I. 

Buxterf  the  son,  in  vindication  of  his  father's  opinion,  hath 
written  an  answer  to  it ;  but  not  with  that  satisfaction  to  the 
learned  world,  as  to  hinder  the  i^enerahty  of  them  from  going 
into  the  other  opinion.  I  shall  here  first  state  the  question, 
and  then  inquire  on  which  side  of  it  the  truth  lieth. 

And  first,  as  to  the  state  of  the  question,  it  is  to  be  observed, 
that  it   is  upon  another  foot  among  us  Christians,  than   it  is 
among  the  Jews.     For  among  them  it  is  a  principle  agreed 
on  ol  both  sides,  and  which  Elias  Levitacomes  in  unto  as  much 
as  any  of  the  rest,  that  the  reading,  as  now  fix»;d  and  settled 
by  the  vowel  points  in  all  the  books  of  the  hoiy  Scripture,  is 
the  true,  genuine,  and  authentic  reading,  as  it   came  from 
the  sacred  penmen  themselves  of  the  said   books,  and  con- 
sequently   is   as    much    of  divine    authority  as  the  letters  : 
only    the    latter   were    written,    and    the    other   delivered 
down  only  by  oral  tradition.     The  question,  therefore,  be- 
tween them  is  ©n!y  about  the  time  when  this  reading  was  first 
marked  and  expressed   in  their  Bibles  by  the  present  vowel 
points.     This  Elias  and  his  followers  say,  was  not  done  till 
after  the  finishing  of  the  Talmud,  about  five  hundred  years  af- 
ter Christ;  but  that  till  then  thetrue  reading,  asto  the  vowels, 
was  preserved  only  by  oral   tradition.     But  others  of  them 
hold   (and  this  is  the   prevailing  opinion  among  them,)  that 
the  reading  by  oral  tradition  was  only  till  the  time  of  Ezra, 
and  that  ever  since  it  hath  been  written  down  and  expressed 
by  the  vowel  points  affixed  to  the  letters  in  the  same  manner 
as  we  now  have  them.     So  that  the  controversy  among  them 
is  not  about  the  truth   and  authority  of  the  reading  accord- 
ing to  the  present  punctuation  (for  they  all  hold  this  to  be 
the  very   same  which  was  dictated  with  the  word  itself  by 
the  holy  Spirit  of  God   from  the  beginning,)  but  about  the 
antiquity  of  the  figures  and  points,   whereby   it  is  marked 
and  fixed  in  their  present  Bibles.     But    among  us    Chris- 
tians, who  have  no  regard  to  what  the  Jews  tell  us  of  their 
oral  tradition,  and  their  preserving  of  the  true   reading  of 
the  Scriptures  by  it,  the  question   is  about  the  authority  of 
the  reading   itself;  that  is,  whether  the  vowel  points  were 
affixed  by  Ezra,  and  therefore  of  the  same  divine  authority 
with  the  rest  of  the  text,  or  else  invented  since  by  the  Jew- 
ish critics  called  the  Masorites  :  and  whether  therefore  they 
may  not,  as  being  of  human  authority  only,  be   altered  and 
changed,   where  the  analogy   of  grammar,  the  style  of  the 
language,  or  the  nature  of  the  context,  or  any  thing  else,  shall 
give  reason  for  a  better  reading  ?     And  this  being  the  state 
of  the  question,  as  it  is  now  in  debate  among  Christians,  that 
«rde  of  it  which  I  have  here  last  mentioned  is  that  which  is 


BOOK  v.]       THE  OLP  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  451 

now  generally  held  for  the  truth  ;  and  these  following  argu- 
ments make  strongly  for  it. 

I-  The  sacred  books  made  use  of  among  the  Jews  in  their 
synagogues  have  ever  been,  and  still  are,  without  the  vowel 
points  ;''■  which  could  not  have  happened,  had  they  been 
placed  there  by  Ezra,  and  consequently  been  of  the  same 
authority  with  the  letters  ;  for  had  they  been  so,  they  would 
certainly  have  been  preserved  in  the  synagogues  with  the 
same  care  as  the  rest  of  the  text.  There  can  scarce  any 
other  reason  be  given  why  they  were  not  admitted  thither, 
but  that  when  the  holy  Scriptures  began  lirst  to  be  publicly 
read  to  the  people  in  their  synagogues,  there  were  no  sucli 
vowel  points  then  in  being;  and  that  when  they  afterward 
came  in  use,  being  known  to  be  of  an  human  invention,  they 
were  for  that  reason  never  thought  tit  to  be  added  to  those  sa- 
cred copies,  which  were  looked  on  as  the  true  representatives 
of  the  original ;  and  therefore  they  have  been  ever  kept 
with  the  same  care  in  the  ark  or  sacred  chest  of  the  syna- 
gogue, as  the  original  draught  of  the  law  of  Moses  anciently 
was  in  the  ark  or  sacred  chest  of  the  tabernacle,  which  was 
prepared  for  it ;  and  they  are  still  so  kept  in  the  same  man- 
ner among  them  even  to  this  day." 

2.  The  ancient  various  readings  of  the  sacred  text,  called 
Keri  Cetib,  are  all  about  the  letters,  and  none  about  the 
vowel  points;''  which  seems  manifestly  to  prove  that  the 
vowel  points  were  not  anciently  in  being,  or  else  were  not 
then  looked  on  as  an  authentic  part  of  the  text  ;  for,  if  they 
had,  the  variations  of  these  would  certainly  have  been  taken 
notice  of,  as  well  as  those  of  the  letters. 

3.  The  ancient  Cabbalists  draw  none  of  their  mysteries 
from  the  vowel  points,  but  all  from  the  letters  •/  which  is  an 
argument  either  that  these  vowel  points  were  not  in  use  in 
their  time,  or  else  were  not  then  looked  on  as  an  authentic 
part  of  the  sacred  text;  for  had  they  then  been  so,  these  tri- 
flers  would  certainly  have  drawn  mysteries  from  the  one,  as 
well  as  from  the  other,  as  the  latter  Cabbalists  have  done. 

4.  If  we  compare  with  the  present  pointed  Hebrew  Bibles 
the  version  of  the  Septuagint,  the  Chaldee  paraphrases,  the 
fragments  of  Aquila,  Symmachus,  and  Theodotion,  or  the 
Latin  version  of  Jerome,  we  shall  in  several  places  find,  that 
they  did  read  the  text  otherwise  than  according  to  the  pre- 
sent punctuation,'^  which   is  a  certain  argument,    that  the 

t  Arcanum  Puiiclationis,  lib.  l,c.  4. 
u  Buxtorfii  Synagoga  Judaica,  c.  14. 
X  Arcanum  Punctationis,  lib.  1,  c.  7. 
y  Arcanum  Punctationis,  lib.  1,  c.  5. 
z  Arcanum  Punctationis,  lib.  1,  c.  8,  9,  10. 


452  CONNEXION  OP  THE  HISTORY  OF  [pAIlT  J. 

pointed  copies,  if  there  were  any  such  in  their  times,  were 
not  then  held  to  be  of  any  authority  ;  for  otherwise  they 
would  certainly  have  followed  them. 

5.  Neither  the  Mishnah  nor  the  Gemara,  either  that  of 
Jerusalem,  or  that  of  Babylon,  do  make  any  mention  of 
these  vowel  points;*  although  in  several  places  there  are 
such  special  occasions  and  reasons  for  them  so  to  have  done, 
that  it  can  scarce  be  thought  possible  they  could  have  omit- 
ted it,  if  they  had  been  in  being  when  those  books  were  writ- 
ten ;  or  if  in  being,  had  been  looked  on  by  the  Jews  of  those 
times  to  be  of  any  authority  among  them.  Neither  do  we 
find  the  least  hint  of  them  in  Philo  Judasus  or  Josephus,'' 
whoarc  the  oldest  writers  of  the  Jews,  or  in  any  of  the  ancient 
Christian  writers  for  several  hundred  years  after  Christ. 
And  although  among  them  Oiigen  and  Jerome  were  well 
skilled  in  the  Hebrew  language,  yet  in  none  of  their  writings 
do  they  speak  the  least  of  them.  Origen  flourished  in  the 
third,  and  Jerome  in  the  fifth  century  ;  and  the  latter  having 
lived  a  long  while  in  Judea,  and  there  more  especially 
applied  himself  to  the  study  of  the  Hebrew  learning,  and 
much  conversed  with  the  Jewish  rabbies  for  his  improvement 
herein,  it  is  not  likely  that  he  could  have  missed  making 
some  mention  of  them  through  all  his  voluminous  works, 
if  thev  had  been  cither  in  being  among  the  Jews  in  his  time, 
or  in  any  credit  or  authority  with  them,  and  that  especially, 
since,  in  his  commentaries,  there  were  so  many  necessary 
occasions  for  his  taking  notice  of  them  ;  and  it  cannot  be  de- 
nied, but  that  this  is  a  very  strong  argument  against  them. 

Many  more  arguments  arc  urged  on  tb.is  side  of  thequestion. 
But  the  chief  strength  of  what  is  said  for  it  lying  in  these 
I  have  mentioned,  I  shall  not  trouble  the  reader  with  the 
rest,  and  that  espccialiy  since  some  of  them  will  not  hold 
water.  For,  to  instni'.cc  in  one  of  them,  great  stress  is  laid 
on  this  to  prove  the  vowel  points  to  be  of  late  date,  that 
their  names  are  thought  to  be  of  late  date,  they  being  of  the 
Chaldce,  and  not  of  the  Hebrew  dialect.  But  it  is  certain 
the  Jews  liad  their  present  natnes  of  their  months  from  the 
Chaldeans,  as  well  as  the  names  of  their  vowels  ;  and  yet  it 
is  as  certain,  that  notwitiistanding  this  the  names  of  these 
months  were  in  use  in  the  time  of  Ezra  ;  for  they  are  nanicd 
in  Scripture,  both  in  the  book  of  Ezra,  and  also  in  that  of  Nc- 
licmiah,  the  former  of  which  was  written  by  him  ;  and  why 
then  might  not  the  names  of  these  vowels  have  been  in  Ezra's 
'me  too,   notwithstanding   this    objection?     And  this  is  all 

^ich  those  on  the  other  side  contend  for.  But  the  other  ar- 


a^ 


can.  Pure.  o.  o.  h  Arcan.  Punct.  lib.  1,  c  K^- 

\ 


BOOK  v.]  THK  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  453 

guments  which  I  have  above  recited  are  of  much  greater 
weight.  If  any  one  would  see  all  at  large  that  hath  been 
said  on  this  head,  CappeHus's  book  which  I  have  already 
mentioned,  will  fully  furnihh  him  herewith. 

But  there  have  not  been  wanting  learned  men  of  the  con- 
trary opinion  ;  and  much  hath  been  written  for  it,  especially 
by  the  two  Buxtorfs,  the  father  and  the  son.  Their  argu- 
ments, which  carry  the  greatest  weight  with  them,  are  these 
which  follow. 

1.  The  ancient  books  Bahir  and  Zohar,*^  which  are  said  to 
have  been  written,  the  one  a  little  before,  and  the  other  a 
little  after  the  time  of  our  Saviour,  make  express  and  fre- 
quent mention  of  the  vowel  points;  v/hich  argument  would 
be  unanswerable  against  the  latter  invention  of  them,  could 
we  be  sure,  that  these  books  are  as  ancient  as  the  Jews  say 
they  are.  But  there  are  reasons  sufficient  to  convince  us, 
that  both  of  them  are  of  a  much  later  date.*^  There  are 
many  particulars  in  the  books  themselves  which  manifestly 
prove  them  to  be  so  :  and  for  above  one  thousand  years  after 
the  pretended  times  of  their  composure,  they  were  never 
heard  of  among  the  Jews  themselves,  nor  were  they  ever 
quoted,  nor  made  mention  of  by  any  other  writer  during  .ill 
thatinterval ;  which  gives  abundant  reasonto  conclude,  that, 
till  after  these  thousand  years,  they  never  had  any  being ;  but 
that  a  false  date  of  antiquity  hath  been  fraudulently  put  to 
them,  to  recommend  them  to  the  world  with  the  greater 
credit.  The  latter  of  them  halh  been  printed  several  times; 
but  the  other  is  still  in  manuscript.  They  are  both  Cabba- 
listical  books;  and  the  most  they  are  remarkable  for,  is  the 
obscurity  of  their  style,  and  the  strange,  mysterious,  and  un- 
intelligible stulf  contained  in  them. 

2.  That  whereas  it  is  said,  on  the  other  side,  that  the  Ma- 
sorites  of  Tiberias  invented  the  vowel  points  about  live  hun- 
dred years  after  Christ,  this  appears  very  unlikely.®  For  the 
schools  which  the  Jews  had  m  Judea,  were  then  wholly  dis- 
sipated and  suppressed,  and  no  learned  men  there  left  of  suffi- 
cient ability  forsuch  a  performance:  for,  at  that  time,  all  their 
learned  men  were  removed  into  the  province  of  Babylon, 
where  they  had  their  universities  of  Sora,  Naherda,  and 
Pombeditha,  and  nothing  of  (heir  learning  was  then  left  in 
Judea  that  can  make  it  probable  that  such  a  work  could  be 

c  Buxtorfius  pater  in  Tiberiade,  c.  9,  sec.  3.  Buxtorfius  filius  de  Puncto- 
rum  Aiitiquitate,  part  1,  c.  5. 

d  Vide  Arcanum  Punctationis,  lib.  2,  c.  3,  &  Buxtorfii  Bibliotliecana  Rab- 
binicain  in  Bahir  fc  Zohar. 

e  Buxtorfius  pater  in  Tiberiade,  c.  5 — 7.  Buxtorfius  filius  de  Antiquitate 
Piinctorum,  part  2,  c.  11. 


454  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  I. 

done,  either  at  Tiberias,  or  any  where  else  in  that  land,  in 
those  times.  And  besides,  were  the  thing  ever  so  hkely', 
there  is  no  authority  for  it  sufficient  to  support  the  assertion. 
Elias  Levita  indeed  saith  it,  and  Aben  Ezra,  who  wrote  about 
the  middle  of  the  twelfth  century,  is  quoted  for  it ;  but  liigh- 
er  up  it  cannot  be  traced.  For  there  is  nothing  said  in  any 
ancienter  writer  either  of  their  being  invented  by  the  Maso- 
rites  at  Tiberias,  or  any  where  else  after  the  Talmud  ;  and 
it  is  not  likely  that,  if  this  had  been  so  late  an  invention,  a 
matter  so  remarkable,  and  of  such  great  moment,  could  have 
been  wholly  passed  over  in  silence,  without  the  least  men- 
tion made  of  it  by  any  of  the  Jewish  writers.  But  to  all 
this  it  is  replied,  that,  in  historical  matters,  it  is  not  to  be  re- 
garded what  the  Jews  write,  or  what  they  omit  concerning 
them.  That  of  all  nations  in  the  world,  that  have  pretend- 
ed to  any  sort  of  learning,  they  have  taken  the  least  care  to 
record  past  transactions,  and  have  done  it  very  bunglingly, 
and  in  a  manner  that  looks  more  like  fable  than  truth,  wher- 
ever they  have  pretended  to  it.  And  it  is  certain  there  were 
Jews  eminent  in  their  way  of  learning  at  Tiberias  in  St. 
Jerome's  time  :  for  he  tells  us  he  made  use  of  them,  and  he 
died  not  till  the  year  of  our  Lord  420,  wliith  was  but  eighty 
years  before  the  time  assigned  ;  and  it  must  be  acknowledged, 
that  nothing  of  this  can  be  gainsayed.  And  it  is  further  add- 
ed by  tht)se,  who  thus  reply,  that  they  do  not  positively  pin 
down  the  invention  of  these  vowel  points  either  to  the  time 
or  place  which  Elias  Levita  assigneth  for  it ;  but  only  say, 
that  it  must  be  after  the  time  of  the  writings  of  Jerome, 
and  after  the  time  of  the  composure  of  the  Talmud,  because 
in  neither  of  these  any  mention  is  made  of  them  ;  and  (his 
will  necessarily  carry  it  down  below  the  500th  year  of  our 
Lord  ;  but  whether  it  were  then  immediately  done,  or  two 
or  three  hundred  years  afterward,  or  at  Tiberias,  or  else- 
where, they  will  not  take  upon  them  certainly  to  affirm. 
That  the  vowel  points  were  not  affixed  to  the  text  by  Ezra  ; 
that  they  are  not  of  a  divine,  but  only  of  an  human  original, 
and  first  introduced  into  use  after  the  writing  of  the  Talmud, 
is  all  that  they  positively  assert  concerning  this  matter;  and 
that  whatsoever  is  said  beyond  this,  is  only  guess  and  con- 
jecture, which  doth  not  at  all  atfect  the  question  ;  and  there- 
fore they  will  not  contend  about  it. 

3.  If  by  the  Masorites,  who  are  said  to  have  invented  these 
vowel  points,  are  meant  the  authors  of  the  present  Masorah, 
which  is  printed  with  the  great  Bibles  of  Venice  and  Basil, 

f  Capellus  in  Arcano  Functationis,  lib.  2,  c.  15. 


BOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  445 

it  is  certain  they  cannot  be  the  inventors  of  these  points.^ 
For  a  great  part  of  their  criticisms  is  upon  the  vowel  points, 
which  must  necessarily  prove  them  to  liave  been  long  before 
fixed  and  settled  5  for  none  use  to  criticise  upon  their  own 
works.  To  which  it  is  replied,''  that  there  were  Masorites, 
from  the  time  of  Ezra  and  the  men  of  the  great  .>yiic)gogue, 
down  to  the  tmie  of  Ben  Asher  and  Ben  INaplithah,  who 
flourished  about  the  year  of  our  Lord  1030;  that  some  of 
these  invented  the  points  some  time  after  the  making  of  the 
Talmud  ;  and  that,  after  that,  some  of  those  who  succeeded 
then,  perchant'e  two  hundred  or  three  hundred  years  after, 
made  these  criticisms  and  remarks  upon  them.  For  the 
Masorah  that  is  now  printed  in  tli<;  Bibles  above  mentioned, 
is  a  collection  and  abridgment  of  all  the  chief  remarks  and 
criticisms  which  those  men  did  make  upon  the  Hebrew  text, 
from  their  first  beginning  to  the  time  1  have  mentioned.  But 
of  this  1  shall  have  occasion  to  speak  more  at  large  by  and 
by. 

4.  That,  when  the  Hebrew  language  ceased  to  be  the  mo- 
ther-tongue of  the  Jews  (as  it  is  agreed  on  all  hands  that 
it  did  after  the  Babylonish  captivity,)  it  was  scarce  possi- 
ble to  teach  that  language  without  the  vowel  points  ;'  and 
this  is  the  best  and  strongest  argument  that  is  urged  on 
this  side  for  their  having  been  always  in  use  from  that 
time. 

5.  That,  if  it  be  allowed  that  the  present  vowel  points 
are  not  of  the  same  authority  with  the  letters,  but  are  only 
of  a  late  and  human  invention,  it  will  weaken  the  authority 
of  thcholy  Scriptures, and  leave  the  sacred  text  to  an  arbitrary 
and  uncertain  reading  and  interpretation  ;  which  will  give 
too  much  to  the  Papists,  whose  main  design  is  to  destroy  the 
authority  and  certaintj  of  the  holy  Scriptu  res,  that  thereby  they 
may  make  room  for  the  traditions  of  their  church,  and  the 
decisions  of  the  infallible  guide  which  they  pretend  to  have 
therein.  And,  to  avoid  this  ill  consequence,  is  indeed  the 
most  prevailing  cause  that  hath  drawn  into  this  opinion  most 
of  those  learn<'d  Protestants  that  contend  for  it.  But  to  an- 
swer both  these  last  arguments,  and  settle  the  whole  of  this 
controversy,  I  shall  lay  down  what  appears  to  xne  to  be  the 
truth  of  the  matter  in  these  following  positions  : 

I.  That  the  vowel  points  having  never  been  received  by 
the  Jews  into  their  s_)nagogues,  this  seems  to  be  a  certain 
evidence,  that  they  were  never  anciently  looked  on  by  them 

g  Buxtorfius  pater  in  Tiberiade,  c.  9.  Buxtorfius  filius  de  Antiquilate  Punc- 
torum,  part  2,  c.  6. 

h  Arcanum  Punctationis,  lib.  2,  c.  10. 

i  Buxtorfius  de  Antiqiiitafe  Pnnctornm,  part  2.  c.  10 


456  CONNEXION  OF  THE   HISTORY  OF  [PART  i. 

as  an  authentic  part  of  the  holy  Scripture  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment, but  reckoned  only  as  an  human  invention  added  for 
the  easier  reading  of  the  text,  after  the  Hebrew  ceased  from 
being  a  vulgar  langunge  among  tliem.  And  the  Jews  having 
been  till  the  time  of  Christ,  thr  true  church  of  God,  and  his 
chosen  people,''  to  whom  those  Scriptures  and  sacred  oracles 
of  God  were  given  and  committed,  through  their  hands  the 
church  of  Christ  hath  received  them,  and  their  evidence  is 
that  which  is  to  witness  and  determine  unto  us  what  part  of 
them  is  authentic  Scripture,  and  what  is  not. 

II.  It  is  most  likely  that  these  vowel  points  were  the  inven- 
tion of  the  iVIasorites,  a  little  after  the  time  of  Ezra.  That 
they  came  into  use  a  little  after  the  lime  of  Ezra,  seems  to 
be  proved  by  the  need  that  was  liien  of  them  for  the  reading 
and  teaching  of  the  Hebrew  text.  And  that  they  were  in- 
vented by  the  Masorites,  seems  most  likely,  because  of  the 
business  and  profession  which  these  men  employed  them- 
selves in.     For, 

1st.  These  Masorites  were  a  set  of  men,  whose  profession  it 
was  to  write  out  copies  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures,  and  to 
criticise  upon  them,  and  also  to  preserve  and  teach  the  true 
readings  of  them  ;^  and  what  they  observed  and  taught  in 
order  hereto  is  by  the  Jews  called  the  Masorah.  But  this 
tradition  reached  no  farther  than  the  readings  of  the  Hebrew 
Scriptures  :  for,  as  the  Jews  held  a  tradition  of  the  true  in- 
terpretations of  the  holy  Scriptures  (which  1  have  already 
spoken  of,)  so  also  did  they  hold  another  of  the  true  readings  of 
them,  as  in  the  original  Hebrew  language.  And  this  last  they 
will  have,  as  to  the  law,  to  be  a  constitution  of  Moses  from 
Mount  Sinai,  as  well  as  the  former.  For  their  doctrine  is,  that 
when  God  gave  unto  Moses  the  law  in  Mount  Sinai,  he  taught 
him  first  the  true  readings  of  it,  and  secondly  the  true  in- 
terpretations of  it ;  and  that  both  these  were  handed  down, 
from  generation  to  generation,  by  oral  tradition  only,  till  at 
length  the  readings  were  written  by  the  accents  and  vowels, 
in  like  manner  as  the  interpretations  were  by  the  Mishnah 
and  Gemara.  The  former  they  call  Masorah,  which  signitieth 
tradition,  and  the  other  they  call  Cabbala,  which  signitieth 
reception;  but  both  of  them  denote  the  same  thing,  that  is,  a 
knowledge  delivered  down  from  generation  to  generation  ; 
in  the  doing  of  which,  there  being  tradition  on  the  one  hand, 
and  reception  on  the  other,  that  which  relates  to  the  readings 
of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  hath  its  name  from  jthe  former, 
and  that  which  relates  to  the  interpretations  of  them  from  the 

kRom.  iii.2. 

1  Eliae  Levitse  Masoreth  Hammasoretli.    Buxtorfius  in  Tiberiade.    Wai 
<oni  prolcgoro.S. 


ilOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  457 

latter.  And  what  they  say  of  this  as  to  the  law,  they  say  also 
of  it  as  to  the  prophets  and  the  rest  of  the  Hebrew  Scrip- 
tures; that  is,  that  the  true  readings  of  them,  as  well  as  the 
true  interpretations  of  them,  were  delivered  down  by  oral 
tradition  from  those  who  were  the  first  penmen  of  them,  to 
whom,  they  say,  God  revealed  both  at  the  same  time  when 
he  revealed  to  them  the  word  itself.  As  those  who  studied 
and  taught  the  Cabbala  were  called  the  Cabbalists,  so  those 
who  studied  and  taught  the  Masorah  were  called  the  Maso- 
rites.  For  although  the  word  Cabbala  be  now  restrained  to 
signify  the  mystical  interpretations  of  the  Scriptures  only, 
and,  in  the  common  usage  of  speech  now  amotig  the  Jews, 
they  alone  are  called  Cabbalists  who  give  themselves  up  to 
these  dotages  ;  yet,  in  the  true  and  genuine  meaning  of  the 
word,  the  Cabbala  extends  to  all  manner  of  traditions  which 
are  of  the  interpretative  part  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  ;  and 
the  Cabbalist  is  the  general  name  of  all  those  who  professed 
the  study  and  knowledge  of  them ;  and  they  were  all  those 
whom,  under  the  names  of  Tannaim,  Amoraim,  Seburaim, 
&c.  I  have  already  made  mention  of.  And  as  these  Cabba- 
lists first  began  a  little  after  the  time  of  Ezra,  so  also  did  the 
Masorites ;  and  their  whole  business  and  profession  being  to 
study  the  true  readings  of  the  Hebrew  text,  and  to  preserve 
and  teach  the  same,  they  are  justly  held  the  most  likely  to 
have  invented  the  vowel  points,  because  the  whole  use  of 
those  points  is  to  serve  to  this  purpose.     And, 

2dly.  This  use  of  them  being  absolutely  necessary,  from 
the  time  that  the  Hebrew  language  ceased  to  be  vulgarly 
spoken  (as  it  certainly  did  in  the  time  of  Ezra,)  we  have 
sufficient  reason  from  hence  to  conclude,  that  soon  after  that 
time  the  use  of  them  must  have  been  introduced  :  for  from 
this  time  the  Hebrew  language  being  only  to  be  acquired  by 
study  and  instruction,  and  that  being  necessary  to  be  first  ac- 
quired, before  the  sacred  text  could  be  read,  which  was  writ- 
ten therein  :  as  there  was  need  of  such  a  profession  of  men  to 
take  care  hereof,  that  is,  to  teach  and  bring  up  others  to 
know  the  language,  and  also  to  read  the  Scriptures  as  written 
in  it;  so  was  there  as  much  need  of  these  vowel  points  to 
help  them  herein,  it  being  hard  to  conceive,  how  they  could 
do  either  without  them,  or  some  other  such  marks  that  might 
serve  them  for  the  same  purpose.  What  the  Jews  tell  us  of 
preserving  the  true  readings  only  by  tradition  and  memory 
is  too  absurd  to  be  swallowed  by  an)'  one ;  for  had  there 
been  nothing  else  but  tradition  and  memory  in  this  case  to 
help  them,  the  load  would  have  been  too  great  to  have  been 
carried  by  anv  one's  memory,  but  all  must  necessarily  have 

Vol.  I.      "  5n 


468  CONNEXION  OF  THE  IIISTORV  OF  [PAKI'  lo 

dropped  in  the  way,  and  been  lost.  But  the  truth  is,  there  is 
no  need  of  depending  only  on  memory  in  this  case  ;  for  to 
those  who  thoroughly  know  the  language,  the  letters  alone, 
with  the  context,  are  sufficient  to  determine  the  reading,  as 
now  they  are  in  all  other  Hebrew  books ;  for,  excepting  the 
Bible,  (ew  other  books  in  that  language  are  pointed.  All 
their  rabbinical  authors,  of  which  there  are  a  great  number,, 
are  all  unpointed  ;™  and  yet  all  that  understand  the  language 
can  read  them  without  points  as  well  as  if  they  had  them, 
yea  and  much  better  too.  and  not  miss  the  true  reading.  But 
the  dilficulty  is  as  to  those  who  do  not  understand  the  language; 
for  how  they  could  be  ever  taught  to  read  it  without  vowels, 
after  it  ceased  to  be  vulgarly  spoken,  is  scarce  possible  ta 
conceive.  When  all  learned  it  from  their  cradles,  it  was  no 
hard  matter  for  those  who  thus  understood  the  language  to 
learn  to  read  it  by  the  letters  only  without  the  vowels.  But 
when  the  Hebrew  became  a  dead  language,  the  case  was  al- 
tered :  for  then,  instead  of  understanding  it  first  in  order  to- 
read  it,  they  were  first  to  read  it  in  order  to  understand  it ; 
and  therefore,  having  not  the  previous  knowledge  of  the 
language  to  direct  them  herein,  they  must  necessarily  have 
had  some  other  helps  whereby  to  know  with  what  vowel 
every  syllable  was  to  be  pronounced  ;  and  to  give  them  this 
help  the  vowel  points  seem  certainly  to  have  been  invented  : 
and  therefore  the  time  of  this  invention  cannot  be  placed 
later  than  the  time  when  they  became  necessary,  that  is, 
when  the  Hebrew  came  to  be  a  dead  language,  though  per- 
chance it  was  not  perfected  and  brought  to  that  order  in  which 
it  now  is  till  some  ages  after.  It  is  acknowledged  on  all  hands, 
that  the  reading  of  the  Hebrew  language  could  never  have 
been  learned,  after  it  ceased  to  be  vulgarly  spoken,  without 
the  help  of  vowels :  but  they  who  will  not  allow  the  points  ta 
have  been  so  ancient  tell  us,  that  the  letters  Aleph,  He,  Vau, 
Yod,  which  they  call  mat  res  lectioiiis,  then  served  for  vowels." 
But  there  are  a  great  number  of  words  in  the  Hebrew  way  of 
writing,  both  in  the  Bible  and  in  all  other  books  of  that 
language,  in  which  none  of  these  letters  are  to  be  found,  and 
searce  any  in  which  some  of  the  syllables  are  not  without 
them  ;  and  how  then  can  these  supply  the  place  of  vowels, 
and  every  where  help  the  reading  instead  of  them,  since 
every  where  they  are  not  to  be  found?  Besides,  there  are 
none  of  these  letters  which  have  not,  according  as  they  are 
placed  in  different  words,  the  diflferent  sounds  of  every  one  of 

m  All  those  authors,  as  origiiijilly  written,  are  without  points.  But  the 
Mishnah  and  their  Machzor  have  lately  liad  points  put  to  them;  but  still 
llfey  are  reckoned  the  best  editions  that  are  without  tliem. 

n  Arcanum  Pnnclatioui?.  lib.  1.  c.  18» 


^OOK  V.J  THE  OLD  AND  XEW  TESTAMENTS.  45.9 

the  vowels  some  time  or  other  annexed  to  them;  and  how  then 
can  they  determine  the  pronunciation  of  any  one  of  them? 
As,  for  example,  the  letter  Aleph  hath  not  always  the  pro- 
nunciation of  the  vowel  [a,]  but  sometimes  of  [e,]  sometimes 
of  [i,]  sometimes  of  [o,]  and  sometimes  of  [u,]  according  as 
it  is  found  in  different  words ;  and  the  same  is  to  be  said  of 
all  the  rest.  And,  farther,  all  the  other  oriental  languages 
have  in  their  alphabets  these  same  letters,  which  the}*  call 
matres  lectionis,  as  well  as  the  Hebrew,  as,  for  example,  the 
Syriac,  the  Arabic,  the  Turkish,  the  Persian,  the  Malayan, 
&c.  and  yet  they  have  their  vowels  too,  to  help  the  reading  : 
neither  can  we  find  that  they  were  ever  without  them;  though 
such  as  are  well  versed  in  any  of  these  languages  read  them 
readily  without  vowels  ;  and  all  the  books,  epistles,  orders, 
and  public  instruments  that  are  in  them,  are  generally  so  writ- 
ten. And  why  then  should  we  think  the  Hebrew  had  not 
such  vowels  also,  especially  when,  after  that  language  had 
ceased  to  be  vulgarly  spoken,  there  was  such  necessity  for 
them?  The  unpointed  words  in  Hebrew  are  the  same  with 
abbreviations  in  Latin  ;  and  if  it  be  impracticable  for  any  no- 
vice to  learn  the  Latin  language  by  books,  wherein  all  the 
words  are  so  abbreviated  that  only  two  or  three  letters  of 
them  stand  for  the  whole,  we  may  justly  infer,  that  it  is  as  im- 
practicable for  any  who  is  a  stranger  to  the  Hebrew  ever  to 
learn  it  by  books,  wherein  all  the  words  are  unpointed  ;  yea, 
and  much  more  so :  for  the  abbreviations  in  Latin  are  cer- 
tain, such  an  abbreviation  being  always  put  for  such  a  word, 
and  for  none  other  :  but  it  is  otherwise  in  the  abbreviations 
of  the  unpointed  Hebrew ;  for  in  them  all  the  vowels  being 
left  out,  the  remaining  letters,  which  are  to  stand  for  the 
whole,  may,  as  pronounced  with  different  vowels,  be  different 
words:  as,  for  example,  there  are  two  conjugations  in  Hebrew, 
one  called  Pihel,  and  the  other  Puhal  ;  the  former  is  an  ac- 
tive, and  the  other  a  passive,  and  both  are  written  throughout 
all  their  moods  and  tenses,  (except  the  infinitive)  with  the 
same  letters,  and  they,  as  differently  pointed,  may  be  either 
the  one  or  the  other  ;  and  although,  in  the  reading,  the  con- 
text may  determine  the  active  from  the  passive,  yet  if  we  do 
not,  by  pointed  books,  first  learn  what  vowels  properly  bC' 
long  to  the  one,  and  what  to  the  other,  how  can  we  know 
with  which  to  read  or  pronounce  either  of  them  in  the  un- 
pointed books  ?  And  abundance  of  other  such  instances  may 
be  given  in  the  Hebrew  laui^uage,  wherein  the  same  letters, 
as  differently  pointed,  make  different  words,  and  of  different 
significations  ;  and  how  then  can  a  learner  know,  what  differ- 
ent vowFil?.  and  what  different  pronimriqfions.  belong  to  these 


•IGO  COX-NEXION  OF  THE  HISTORV  OK  f  PART  I.. 

different  words, if  he  benot  first  taught  it  by  the  points, orsome 
other  such  marks  of  the  same  signification  ?  All  that  can  be 
said  against  this  is,  that  the  Samaritan  hath  no  such  vowels  ; 
but  although  it  be  now  grown  to  be  a  dead  language,  as  well 
as  the  Hebrew,  it  is  taught  and  learned  without  them.  To 
this  I  answer,  that  it  is  true  that  all  the  books  which  we  have 
as  yet  brought  us  into  these  western  parts,  in  the  Samaritan 
character,  are  written  only  with  the  letters,  and  without  any 
such  marks  as  the  Hebrew  Bibles  now  have  to  denote  the 
vowels,  or  any  other  instead  of  them.  But  this  doth  not 
prove,  that  they  have  no  such  vowels  in  use  among  them  : 
multitude  of  books  are  brought  us  out  of  the  East,  in  He- 
brew, Syriac,  Arabic,  Turkish,  and  Persian,  all  written  with 
the  letters  only,  without  any  vowel  marks.  But  this  doth  not 
prove  that  they  have  none  ;  for  it  is  certain  that  they  all  have 
them  and  use  them,  where  there  is  need  of  them  ;  and  there- 
fore it  is  no  evidence,  but  that  the  Samaritan  may  have  them 
also,  though  all  the  books  that  we  have  hitherto  seen  in  it  are 
without  them.  The  sect  of  the  Samaritans  are  those  only 
who  use  this  character  and  language  (if  we  may  call  it  a 
language,  for  it  is  no  more  than  the  Hebrew  in  another  cha- 
racter;) and  they  are  now  dwindled  into  a  very  small  number, 
and  those  dispersed  abroad  into  several  parts  of  the  East. 
And  what  their  practice  may  be  as  to  the  use  of  vowel 
figures  in  their  other  writings  (though  none  that  have  as  yet 
come  to  our  hands  have  any  such,)  we  have  no  account  of, 
either  ;>ro  or  con,  and  therefore  we  can  argue  nothing  from  it. 
Only  we  say,  that  as  to  this,  as  well  as  the  Hebrew,  and  all 
other  such  languages  in  which  books  are  ordinarily  wTitten 
with  the  letters  only,  it  seems  almost  impracticable  for  any 
one  to  learn  to  read  those  books,  after  the  languages  are  be- 
come dead  languages,  without  some  marks  put  to  the  letters 
to  denote  the  vowels  with  which  they  are  to  be  pronounced. 
Without  a  previous  knowledge  of  the  language,  it  is  impos- 
sible to  be  done  ;  and  therefore  the  only  way  to  make  it  pos- 
sible, is  to  learn  the  language  first  by  rote ;  and  when  a 
perfect  knowledge  hath  been  gotten  of  it  this  way,  then  only 
can  it  be  practicable  to  learn  to  read  that  language  by  the  let- 
ters only,  without  any  vowel  marks.  But  this  is  such  a  great 
way  about,  such  a  tedious  and  operose  method  of  learning  it, 
that  we  must  look  on  those  to  be  a  very  dull  and  stupid  sort 
of  people,  who,  being  in  this  case,  could  find  out  no  other 
way  to  help  themselves  in  it ;  and  that  especially  in  the 
Jews'  case,  since  their  neighbours  on  each  side  of  them  (I 
mean  the  Syrians  and  Arabians)  had  vowel  figures,  and  they 
mi^ht  easily  from  them  either  have  taken  the  same,  or  learn- 


BOOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND    NEW  TESTAMENTS.  461 

ed  to  have  framed  others  like  them.  Though  the  Greeks  in 
their  language  have  the  vowels  intermixed  with  the  letters, 
yet  it  no  sooner  became  a  dead  language  (I  mean  the  learn- 
ed Greek,  from  which  the  modern  doth  as  much  differ,  as  the 
Chaldee  from  the  Hebrew,)  but  they  found  out  accents,  spi- 
rits, and  several  other  marks  to  help  those  who  were  to  learn 
it,  which  were  never  in  use  among  them  before.  And  so 
also  are  there  in  the  Latin  several  such  marks  ;  as,  for  ex- 
ample, a  mark  over  the  [oj  and  [e]  at  the  end  of  adverbs,  to 
distinguish  them  from  nouns  ending  in  those  vowels,  and  the 
mark  over  the  [«]  ablative  to  distinguish  it  from  [a]  nomi- 
native, &:c.  none  of  which  marks  were  ever  used,  while  the 
Latin  language  was  vulgarly  spoken,  but  were  invented  foi* 
the  help  of  those  who  were  to  learn  it  afterward.  And  is 
it  possible  that  the  Jews  only  were  so  stupid  and  dull,  that 
they  alone  should  find  out  no  such  helps,  after  their  language 
became  a  dead  language,  for  the  easier  learning  and  reading 
of  it ;  but,  on  the  contrary,  should  have  continued  so  many 
hundred  years  after,  not  only  without  any  marks  for  accents-, 
pauses,  or  stops,  but  also  without  any  figures  so  much  as  to 
denote  the  vowels  with  which  their  letters  were  to  be  pre  - 
nounced  ?  The  necessity  which  was  in  this  case  for  such 
vowel  figures,  evidently  proves  that  they  must  have  had 
them  ;  and  that  as  soon  as  they  needed  them,  which  was,  as 
soon  as  their  language  became  a  dead  language,  and  was 
thenceforth  to  be  learned  by  books  (and  not  by  common 
converse)  as  all  other  dead  languages  are.  And  therefore 
this  happening  about  the  time  of  Ezra  (as  hath  been  alrea- 
dy shown,)  it  must  follow,  that  about  that  time,  or  a  little  af- 
ter, the  use  of  such  vowel  figures  must  have  been  introdu- 
ced into  the  Hebrew  language.  Whether  they  were  the 
same  vowel  points  that  are  now  used,  or  other  such  like  signs 
to  serve  for  the  same  purpose  is  not  material ;  and  there- 
fore I  shall  raise  no  inquiry  about  it.  Only  I  cannot  but 
say,  that  since  necessity  first  introduced  the  use  of  them,  it 
is  most  likely,  that  no  more  were  at  first  used  than  there  was 
a  necessity  for  ;  but  that  the  augmenting  of  them  beyond 
this  to  the  number  of  fifteen,  proceeded  only  from  the  over 
nicety  of  the  after  Masorites.  Three  served  the  Arabs,  and 
five  most  other  nations ;  and  no  doubt  at  first  they  exceeded 
not  this  number  among  the  Jew^s.  And  it  is  most  likely  that 
the  same  profession  of  men,  who  thus  invented  the  vowel 
points,  were  also  the  authors  of  all  those  other  inventions 
■which  have  been  added  to  the  Hebrew  text  for  the  ea- 
sier reading  and  better  imderstanding  of  it.  The  divi- 
ding of  the  law  into  sections,  and  the  sections  into  verses. 


462  CONNEXION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART  /. 

seems  to  have  been  one  of  the  first  of  their  works.  Origi- 
nally every  book  of  the  Hebrew  Bible  was  as  if  written  in  one 
verse,  without  any  distinction  of  sections,  chapters,  verses, 
or  words.P  But  when  the  public  reading  of  the  law  was 
brought  into  use  among  the  Jews,  and  some  part  of  it  read 
every  sabbath  in  their  synagogues,  it  became  necessary  to 
divide  the  whole  into  fifty-four  sections,  that  it  might  thereby 
be  known  what  part  was  to  be  read  on  each  sabbath,  and  the 
whole  gone  over  every  year,  as  hath  been  afore  observed. — 
And,  when  the  disuse  of  the  Hebrew  language  among  them 
made  it  necessary,  that  it  should  not  only  be  read  to  them  in 
the  original  Hebrew,  but  also  interpreted  in  the  Chaldee, 
which  was  then  become  their  vulgar  tongue,  there  was  also 
a  necessity  of  dividing  the  sections  into  verses,  that  they 
might  be  a  direction  both  to  the  reader  and  the  interpreter 
where  to  make  their  stop  at  every  alternative  reading  and 
interpreting,  till  they  had,  verse  by  verse,  gone  through  the 
whole  section.  And  in  imitation  hereof,  the  like  division 
was  afterward  made  in  all  the  rest  of  the  holy  Scriptures. 
And  alike  necessity  about  the  same  time  introduced  the  use 
of  the  vowel  points,  after  they  were  forced  to  teach  the  He- 
brew language  by  book,  on  its  ceasing  to  beany  longer  vulgarly 
spoken  among  the  people.  And  some  time  after,  the  accents 
and  pauses  were  invented  for  the  same  purpose,  that  is,  for  the 
easier  and  more  distinct  reading  of  the  text,  for  which  they 
are  necessary  helps,  as  far  as  they  supply  the  place  of  a  com- 
ma, a  colon,  or  a  full  stop  (which  Athiiach.  Revia,  and  Sil- 
luk,  do  :)  but  as  for  the  musical  use  for  which  only  the 
others  were  added  to  the  Hebrew  text,  they  are  now  wholly 
insignificant,  it  being  long  since  absolutely  forgot  for  what 
use  they  served. 

III.  These  vowel  points  were  for  many  ages  only  of  pri- 
vate use  among  the  Masorites,  whereby  they  preserved  to 
themselves  the  true  readings  of  the  holy  Scriptures,  and 
taught  them  to  their  scholars.  But  they  were  not  received 
into  the  divinity  schools  till  after  the  making  of  the  Talmud  : 
for  there  were  two  sorts  of  schools  anciently  among  the  Jews, 
the  schools  of  the  jVIasorites,  and  the  schools  of  the  Rabbies. 
The  former  taught  only  the  Hebrew  language,  and  to  read 
the  Scriptures  in  it ;  the  others  to  understand  the  Scriptures, 
and  all  the  interpretations  of  them,  and  where  the  great  doc- 
tors of  divinity  among  them,  to  whom  the  Masorites  were  as 
much  inferior  as  the  teachers  of  grammar-schools  among  us 
are  to  the  professors  of  divinity  in  our  universities.     And 

p  Elias  Levitain  Masoreth  Hammasoreth. 


HOOK  V.j  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  4tJ3 

therefore,  as  long  as  these  vowel  points  went  no  higher  than 
the  schools  of  these    Masorites,    they   were   of  no    regard 
among  their  learned  nnen,  or  taken  any  notice  of  by  them. 
And  this  is  the  reason  that  we  find  no  mention  of  them  either 
in  the  Talmud,  or  in  the  writings  of  Origen  or  Jerome.  But, 
some  time  after  the  making  of  the  Talmud  (in  what  year  or 
age  is  uncertain,)    the  punctuation  of  the  Masorites  having 
been  judged  by  the  Jewish  doctors  to  be  as  useful  and  neces- 
sary a  way  for  the  preserving  of  the  traditionary  readings  of 
the  Hebrew  Scriptures,  as  the  Mishnah  and  Gemara  had  been 
then  found  to  be  for  the  preserving  of  the  traditional  rites, 
ceremonies,  and  doctrines,  of  their  religion,  it  was  taken  into 
their  divinity  schools ;  and  it   having  been  there  reviewed 
and  corrected    by  the   learnedest  of  their  rabbies,  and  so 
formed  and  settled  by  them,  as  to  be   made  to  contain  and 
mark  out  all  those  authentic   readings,  which  they   held  to 
have    been   delivered  down   unto  them   by  tradition    from 
Moses  and  the  prophets,  who  were  the  first  penmen  of  them, 
ever  since   that  time  the  points  in  the  Hebrew  Scriptures 
have  been  by   the  Jews   held  of  the  same  authority  for  the 
reading  of  them,  as  the  Mishnah  and  the  Gemara  for  the  in- 
terpreting of  them,  and  consequently  as   unalterable  as  the 
letters  themselves  ;  for  they  reckon  them  both  of  divine  origi- 
nal;  only  with  this   difference,   that  the   letters,   they  say, 
were  written  by  the  holy  penmen  themselves,  but  the  read- 
ings, as  now  marked  by  the  points,  were  delivered  down  from 
them  by  tradition  only    However,  they  have  never  received 
them  into   their  synagogues,  but  have  there  still  continued 
the  use  of  the  holy  Scriptures  in  unpointed  copies  ;  and  so 
do  even  to  this  day,  because  they  so  received  them  from  the 
first  holy  penmen  of  them. 

IV.  All  those  criticisms  in  the  Masorah,  that  are  upon  the 
points,  were  made  by  such  Masorites  as  lived  after  the  points 
were  received  into  the  divinity  schools  of  the  Jews.  For  this 
profession  of  men  continued  from  the  time  of  Ezra,  and  the 
men  of  the  great  synagogue  to  that  of  Ben  Asher  and  Ben 
Naphthaliji  who  were  two  famous  Masorites,  that  lived 
about  the  year  of  our  Lord  1030,  and  were  the  last  of  them  : 
for  they  having,  after  many  years  labour  spent  herein,  each  of 
them  published  a  copy  of  the  whole  Hebrew  text,  as  correct 
-as  they  could  make  it,  the  eastern  Jews  have  followed  that  of 
Ben  Naphthali,  and  the  western  Jews  have  followed  that  of 
Ben  Asher ;  and  all  that  hath  been  done  ever  since,  is  exactly 
to  copy  after  them,  both  as  to  the  points  and  accents,  as  well 

q  Buxtorfius  pater  in  Praefatione  ad  Tiberiadem.  Buxtorfius  filius  de  An- 
tiquitate  Punctorum,  part.  1,  c.  15.  Zacutus  in  Juchasin.  Shalsheleth  Hac- 
•■ahal.i,  Zemacli  Davit).  Elias  Levita.  fcf 


404  CONNEXION   OF   THE  HISTORY  OF  [PARX   1- 

as  to  the  letters,  without  making  any  nnore  corrections  or 
Masoritical  criticisms  or  observations  upon  either.  These 
Masorites,  who  were  the  authors  of  the  Masorah  that  is  now 
extant,  were  a  monstrous  trifling  sort  of  men,  whose  criti- 
cisms and  observations  went  no  higher  than  the  number- 
ing of  the  verses,  words,  and  letters,  of  every  book  in  the 
Hebrew  Bible,  and  the  marking  out  which  was  the  middle 
verse,  word,  and  letter,  in  each  of  them,  and  the  making  of 
Other  such  poor  and  low  observations  concerning  them,  as 
were  not  worth  any  man's  reading,  or  taking  notice  of,  what- 
ever Richard  Simon  the  Frenchman  may  say  to  the  contrary. 

V.  These  vowel  points  having  been  added  to  the  text 
with  the  best  care  of  those  w  ho  best  understood  the  language, 
and  having  undergone  the  review  and  corrections  of  many 
ages,  it  may  be  reckoned,  that  this  work  hath  been  done  in 
the  perfectest  manner  that  it  can  be  done  by  man's  art,  and 
that  none  who  shall  undertake  a  new  punctuation  of  the 
whole  can  do  it  better.  However,  since  it  was  done  only  by 
man's  art,  it  is  no  authentic  part  of  the  hoi)  Scriptures  ;  and 
therefore  these  points  are  not  so  unalterably  fixed  to  the 
text,  but  that  a  change  may  be  made  in  them  when  the 
nature  of  the  context,  or  the  analogy  of  grammar,  or  the 
style  of  the  language,  or  any  thing  else,  shall  give  a  sufli- 
cient  reason  for  it :  and  that  especially,  since,  how  exactly 
soever  they  may  have  been  at  any  time  afiixed  to  the  text, 
they  are  still  liable  to  the  mistakes  of  transcribers  and 
printers,  and  by  reason  of  their  number,  the  smallness  of 
their  figures,  and  their  position  under  the  letters,  are  more 
likely  to  suffer  by  them  than  any  other  sort  of  writing  what- 
soever. 

VI.  It  doth  not  from  hence  follow,  that  the  sacred  text 
will  therefore  be  left  to  an  arbitrary  and  uncertain  read- 
ing. For  the  genuine  reading  is  as  certain  in  the  unpointed 
Hebrew  books,  as  the  genuine  sense  is  in  the  pointed:  the 
former  indeed  may  sometimes  be  mistaken  or  perverted, 
and  so  may  the  latter;  and  therefore,  whether  the  books 
be  pointed  or  unpointed,  this  doth  not  alter  the  case  to 
one  who  thoroughl}  knows  the  language,  and  will  honestly 
read  the  same.  Ignorant  men  may  indeed  mistake  the  reading, 
and  ill  men  may  pervert  it ;  but  those  who  are  knowing  and 
honest  can  do  neither;  for,  except  the  Bible,  no  other  Hebrew 
book  is  pointed,  unless  some  few  of  late  by  modern  hands. 
All  their  Rabbinical  authors  are  unpointed  ;  and  all  their 
other  books,  to  which  the  moderns  have,  in  some  editions, 
added  points,  were  originally  published  without  them,  and 
so  they  still  are  in  the  best  editions  ;  and  yet  this  doth 
not  hinder,  but  that  every  one.  who  understands  the  Hebrew 


BOOK  v.]     THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  46.5 

language,  can  rightly  read  them,  and  rightly  understand 
them.  Were  1  to  make  my  choice,  I  would  desire  to  have 
the  Bible  with  points,  and  all  other  Hebrew  books  without 
them.  I  would  desire  the  Bible  with  points,  because  they 
tell  us  how  the  Jews  did  anciently  read  the  text.  And  I 
would  have  all  other  Hebrew  books  without  them,  because 
in  such  they  rather  hinder  and  clog  the  reading,  than 
help  it,  to  any  one  that  thoroughly  knows  the  language. 
And  all  that  undertake  to  point  such  books,  may  not  al- 
ways do  it  according  to  the  true  and  genuine  reading ;  as 
we  have  an  instance  in  the  pointed  edition  of  the  Mishnah, 
published  in  octavo  by  Manasseh  Ben  Israel  at  Amsterdam. 
And  therefore  it  is  much  better  to  be  left  free  to  our  own 
apprehensions  for  the  genuine  reading,  than  be  confined 
by  another  man's  to  that  which  may  not  be  the  genuine 
reading.  Indeed,  to  read  without  vowels  may  look  very 
strange  to  such  who  are  conversant  only  with  the  modern 
European  languages,  in  which  often  several  consonants 
come  together  without  a  vowel,  and  several  vowels  with- 
out a  consonant,  and  several  of  both  often  go  to  make  up 
one  syllable  ;  and  therefore,  if  in  them  the  consonants  were 
only  written,  it  would  be  hard  to  find  out  what  may  be  the 
word.  But  it  is  quite  otherwise  in  the  Hebrew  ;  for  in 
that  language  there  is  never  more  than  one  vowel  in  one 
syllable,  and  in  most  syllables  only  one  consonant,  and  in 
none  more  than  two  ;  and  therefore,  in  most  words,  the  con- 
sonants confine  us  to  the  vowels,  and  determine  how  the  word 
is  to  be  read,  and,  if  not,  at  least  the  context  doth.  It  must 
be  acknowledged,  that  there  are  several  combinations  of 
the  same  consonants,  which,  as  placed  in  the  same  order,  are 
susceptible  of  different  punctuations,  and  thereby  make 
different  words,  and  of  different  significations,  and  there- 
fore, when  put  alone,  are  of  an  uncertain  reading.  But 
it  is  quite  otherwise  when  they  are  joined  in  context  with 
other  words  ;  for  where  the  letters  joined  in  the  same  word 
do  not  determine  the  reading,  there  the  words  joined  in  the 
same  sentence  always  do.  And  this  is  no  more  than  what 
we  find  in  all  other  languages,  and  very  often  in  our  own; 
for  we  have  many  equivocal  words,  which,  being  put  alone, 
are  of  an  uncertain  signification,  but  are  always  determin- 
ed in  the  context ;  as,  for  example,  the  word  let  in  English, 
when  put  alone  by  itself,  hath  not  only  two  different,  but 
two  quite  contrary  meanings ;  for  it  signifies  to  permit,  and 
it  signifies  also  to  hinder  ;  but  it  never  doth  so  in  the  context, 
hut  is  thereby  always  so  determined,  either  to  the  one  or 
Vol.  I.        ■  "  .59 


4C0  CONNEXION  OK  THE  HISTORY  OF  [PART   I. 

to  the  other,  that  no  one  is  ever  led  into  a  mistake  here- 
by. And  the  sanne  is  to  be  said  of  all  such  words  in  He- 
brew, as,  having  the  same  letters,  are  susceptible  of  various 
punctuations.  The  letters  here  cannot  determine  to  the 
punctuation,  because  they  being  in  each  the  same,  are  indif- 
ferent to  either.  But  what  the  letters  cannot  do,  when  the 
word  is  put  alone  by  itself,  that  the  other  words  always  do 
with  which  it  is  joined  in  the  context.  And  it  is  want  of  at- 
tention, or  want  of  apprehension,  if  any  one  thoroughly  skilled 
in  the  Hebrew  language  makes  a  mistake  herein  ;  which  may 
happen  in  the  reading  of  any  other  books  whatsoever.  And 
therefore,  though  the  Hebrew  Bibles  had  never  been  point- 
ed, we  need  not  be  sent  either  to  the  church  of  Rome  or  any 
where  else  for  the  fixing  of  the  readings  of  it,  the  letters  alone, 
with  the  context,  being  sufficient,  when  we  thoroughly  un- 
derstand the  language,  to  determine  us  thereto. 

There  is,  in  the  church  of  St.  Dominic  in  Bononia,  a  copy 
of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures,  kept  with  a  great  deal  of  care, 
which  they  pretend  to  be  the  original  copy  written  by  Ezra 
himself  ;"■  and  therefore  it  is  there  valued  at  so  high  a  rate, 
that  great  sums  of  money  have  been  borrowed  by  the  Bo- 
nonians  upon  the  pawn  of  it,  and  again  repaid  for  its  redemp- 
tion. It  is  written  in  a  very  fair  character,  upon  a  sort  of 
leather,  and  made  up  in  a  roll,  according  to  the  ancient  man- 
ner, but  it  having  the  vowel  points  annexed,  and  the  writing 
being  fresh  and  fair,  without  any  decay,  both  these  particu- 
lars prove  the  novelty  of  that  copy.  But  such  forgeries  are 
no  uncommon  things  among  the  papistical  sect. 

But,  though  Ezra's  government  overall  Judah  and  Jerusa- 
lem expired  with  this  year,  yet  his  labour  to  serve  the  church 
of  God  did  not  here  end ;  for  still  he  went  on  as  a  preach- 
er of  righteousness,  and  a  skilful  scribe  of  the  law  of  God, 
to  perfect  the  reformation  which  he  had  begun,  both  in  pre- 
paring for  the  people  correct  editions  of  the  Scriptures,  and 
also  in  bringing  all  things  in  church  and  state  to  be  conform- 
ed to  the  rules  thereof.  And  this  he  continued  to  do  as 
long  as  he  lived;  and  herein  he  was  thoroughly  assisted  and 
supported  by  the  next  governor  ;  who  coming  to  Jerusalem 
with  the  same  intention,  and  the  same  zeal  for  promoting  of 
Ihe  honour  of  God  and  the  welfare  of  his  people  in  Judah 
and  Jerusalem,  as  Ezra  did,  he  struck  in  heartily  with  him  in 
the  work ;  so  that  Ezra  went  on  still  to  do  the  same  things 
fey  the  authority  of  the  new  governor  which  he  before  did  bv 

r  Fini  Adrian!  Flagelluin  Judaeorum,  lib.  9,  c.  2.  Tissardi  Ambacei  Granij 
mat.  Hebrfea.     Hnttingpri  Thesanrtis  Philologicus.  p.  11.5,  513, 


ROOK  v.]  THE  OLD  AND  NEW  TESTAMENTS.  467 

his  own.  And  by  their  thus  joining  together  in  the  same  holy 
undertaking,  and  their  mutual  assisting  each  other  therein,  it 
exceedingly  prospered  in  their  hands,  till  at  length,  notwith- 
standing all  manner  of  oppositions  both  from  within  and  from 
without,  it  was  brought  to  full  perfection,  forty-nine  years 
after  it  had  been  begun  by  Ezra.  Whether  Ezra  lived  so 
long  or  not  is  uncertain  :  but  what  he  did  not  live  to  do  was 
completed  by  the  piety  and  zeal  of  his  successor  ;  with  an 
account  of  whose  transactions  1  shall  begin  the  next  book. 


END  OP  VOLUME  FIRST. 


INDEX  TO  VOL.  1. 


Abraham  held  in  veneration  by  the 
Magi  324. 

Ahasuerus.  See  Astyages  167.  See 
Cambyses  263,  310.  See  Artax- 
erxes  Longimanus  352,  conjectures 
about  him  ib.  his  kindness  to  the 
Jews  354. 

Ahaz  king  of  Judah,  his  wicked 
reign  92—96,  and  distresses  92,  93, 
and  losses,  94,  becomes  tributary  to 
Arbaces  102,  his  idolatry  ib.  his 
death  and  ignominious  burial  105. 

Ahaziah  king  of  Israel,  partner  in  the 
trade  to  Ophir  with  Jehoshaphat 
king  of  Judah  98. 

Ahikam,  his  friendship  to  Jeremiah 
151. 

Altar  for  burnt-offerings  described 
234. 

Amasis  usurps  tlie  kingdom  of  Egypt 
183,  viceroy  to  Nebuchadnezzar 
186,  slays  Apries  ib.  his  death  264, 
indignities  olTered  him  afterward 
266. 

Ammonites  carried  into  captivity  by 
the  Assyi-ians  182. 

Amon  king  of  Judah,  his  wicked 
reign  134,  his  death  ib.  revenged  ib. 

Amos,  his  prophecy  of  the  captivity 
of  the  Jews  fulfilled  103. 

Amyrtaeus  reigns  in  the  fens  of  Egypt 
410. 

Anna,  Tobit's  wife,  carried  into  cap- 
tivity 108. 

Anointing  of  kings  and  priests  255. 

Apis  the  Egyptian  god  described  267, 
killed  by  Cambyses  268. 

Apries  succeeds  his  father  Psammis 
king  of  Egypt  167,  deceives  Ze- 
dekiah  171,  forced  to  fly  from  the 
usurper  Amasis  183,  slain  by  him 
186,  his  pride  187. 

Apronadius  king  of  Assyria  117,  his 
death  120. 

Arabs  preserve  and  restore  the  an, 
cicnt  names  of  places  150. 

Arbaces  founds  the  second  Assyrian 
monarcliy  91.     See  Tiglath  Pileser. 

Archimagus  high  priest  of  the  Ma- 
giaus  322,  Darius  takes  tliat  office 
326. 

Arimanius,  the  evil  god  of  the  Per- 
sians 276. 

Aristides,  the  Athenian,  his  exploits 
337, 342. 

Aristotle,  how  many  lines  his  works 
consisted  of  440. 
VOL.  I,  60 


Ark  of  the  covenant  described  240,  its 
history  ib.  248. 

Arkianus  king  of  Babylon  IIC, 

Arphaxad.     See  Deioces. 

Artabasaues,  son  of  Darius,  yields  the 
crown  to  his  younger  brother  308. 

Artaxerxes,  third  son  of  Xerxes,  made 
king  351,  slays  his  elder  brother  ib. 
why  surnamed  Longimanus  352, 
Ahasuerus  353,  his  army  routed  in 
Egypt  368,  bribes  the  Lacedemo- 
nians 359. 

Artaxerxes.     See  Smerdis. 

Ashdod,  its  strength  124,  blockade  of 
29  years  ib.  Jeremiah's  saying  of  it 
124. 

Askelon,  temple  of  Venus  robbed  by 
the  Scythians  136. 

Assyrian  empire,  its  duration  139,219. 

A  sty  ages  of  Media,  marries  one  of  his 
daughters  to  Nebuchadnezzar  139, 
another  to  Cambyses  king  of  Persia 
162,  succeeds  his  father  Cyaxares 
167,  the  same  with  Ahasuerus  ib- 
his  death  203. 

Astronomers  of  the  Sabian  sect  275. 

Athenians  quarrel  with  Darius  298, 
murder  his  herald  306,  quit  their 
city  for  the  fear  of  Xerxes  334, 
Persian  fleet  in  their  harbours  335, 
refuse  to  make  peace  with  the 
Persians  337,  destroy  their  fleet, 
and  armies  ib.  and  339,  assist  the 
Egyptians  358,  rout  the  Persians 
359,  their  losses  in  Egypt  410,  411. 

Athens  burnt  bv  the  Persians  337. 
B. 

Babylon,  confusion  in  that  kingdom 
121,  taken  by  the  Assyrians  ib.  its 
grandeur  under  I^ebuchadnezzar 
187— 199,  taken  by  Cyrus,  215,  its 
kingdom  destroyed  219,  prophecies 
about  it  fulfilled  ib.  rebels  against 
Darius  284,  cruelty  of  the  citizens 
285,  taken,  destroyed  287. 

Babylonians,  how  early  they  made  as- 
tronomical observations  1 93. 

Balch  in  Persia,  the  residence  of  the 
Persian  kings  of  the  Sabian  sect  319, 
Zoro.istres  325,  healthy  325. 

Baruch  employed  by  Jeremiah  to  pub- 
lish his  prophecies  133,  157,  hides 
himself  ib.  his  brother  sent  by  Je- 
remiah to  Babylon  with  his  prophe- 
cies against  that  city,  165. 

Baruch,  the  book  so  called,  supposed 
to  be  a  fiction,  and  why  166,  what 
account  of  its  authority  372,  note , 


-i70 


INDEX. 


Bel  and  the  Dragon,  a  lable  261 . 

Bel,  temple  of,  destroyed  by  Xerxes 
340. 

Bel,  his  image  set  up  by  Nebuchad- 
nezzar 179. 

Belisus  succeeds  Esarhaddon  king  of 
Assyria  117. 

Belshazzar.     See  Nabonadius. 

Belus  founds  the  kingdom  of  Baby- 
lon 91. 

Belus,  temple  of,  at  Babylon  191,  its 
tower  mentioned  by  Herodotus  ib. 
bigger  than  that  of  Jerusalem  193. 

Bethshean  taken  from  the  Jews  by 
the  Scythians  136,  thence  called 
Scythopolis  ib. 

Bible,  the  Jewish  434,  435,  some 
books  want  the  correctness  of  others 
435,  how  read  436,  how  at  first  writ- 
139,  447,  concordance  made  to  it 
442,  of  its  vowels  and  pointing  450 
—467. 

Bible,  Christian,  when  divided  into 
chapters  443, 444. 

Bible  of  Bonoaia,  said  to  be  Ezra's,  a 
cheat  466. 

Bigthan  and  Teresh,  their  conspiracy 
against  king  Ahasuerus  409,  disco- 
vered by  Mordecai  ib. 

Boated  to  death,  the  manner  of  it  in 
Persia  334. 

Boccharis  king  of  Egypt,  burnt  alive 
107. 

Books  of  holy  Scripture,  how  divided 
by  the  Jews  434, 436. 

Branchidae,  a  Milesian  family,  betray 
their  temple  340,  settled  in  Persia 
by  Xerxes  ib.  destroyed  by  Alex- 
ander the  Great  ib. 

Brazen  serpent  destroyed  by  Heze- 
kiah  107,  the  Papists'  impudence 
about  it  ib. 

Burial  place  of  the  kings  of  Juduh 
described  118. 

Burial  place,  honourable,  denied  to 
wicked  kings  by  the  Jews  118. 
C. 

Cabbalists,  Jewish  doctors  so  called 
456. 

Cabbala,  what  456. 

Cadytis,  Jerusalem  so  called  by  Hero- 
dotus 147. 

Calendar,  Jewish,  when  made  284. 

Callisthenes  the  pliilosopher,  his  ob- 
servations of  tlie  Chaldean  astrono- 
my 193. 

Calves,  golden  set  up  by  Jeroboam, 
carried  from  Jerusalem  by  the  As- 
syrians 104. 
Cambyses  son  of  Cyrus  succeeds  him 
264,  his  war  with  Egypt  ib.  182. 
successes  ib.  265,  his  agents  in 
Ethiopia,  despised   266.   his  armv 


destroyed  267,  whips  the  tgyptiau 
priests,  and  kills  their  god  Apis 
268,  kills  his  wife  ib.  sets  his  suc- 
cessors an  example  of  incestuou'^ 
marriages  269,  his  madness  ib.  his 
death  ib. 

Canon,  Jewish,  of  Scripture,  when 
completed  432 — 441. 

Captivity,  head  of  the,  an  officer  amoiig 
the  Jews  at  Babylon  203. 

Carthaginians  league  with  Xerxe" 
against  the  Greeks  332,  routed  in 
Sicily  336. 

Chapters,  the  division  of  Scripture 
into  them  441,  v/hy  Scripture  divi- 
ded into  chapters  442. 

Children,  three,  carried  captives  front 
Judea  to  Babylon  155,  preferred 
there  159,  their  zeal  for  their  reli- 
gion ib. 

Cliinzerus,  king  of  Babylon,  his  reigix 
109. 

Christ's  coming,  Daniel's  prophecy  of 
seventy  weeks  concerning  it  made 
clear  362 — 408,  when  they  begin 
368,  390,  when  completed  ib.  per- 
plexed 403. 

Chynilidanus  succeeds  his  father  Sa- 
osdiichinus  king  of  Assyria  133,  his 
effeminacy  136. 

Cimou,  his  descent  305,  his  relation  t< 
Thucydides  ib.  his  wars  ngainst  the 
Persians  350,  destroyj  their  fleet  ib . 
recovers  his  father's  territory  ib. 
tried  for  his  life,  and  why  ib. 

Concordance,  Latin,  the  first  that  was 
made  442. 

Concordance,  Hebrew,  when  made, 
403. 

Contributions  of  the  Jews  towards  re- 
building their  temple,  their  amounc 
234. 

Cornelius  Agrippa,  why  taken  for  a 
conjurer  320,  and  note. 

Crassus,  his  riches  413. 

Croesus  succeeds  his  father  Alyattes 
in  the  kingdom  of  Lydia  202,  com- 
mands the  Babylonian  army  207, 
his  wars  212,  routed  by  Cyrus  ib. 
his  saying  as  he  was  to  die  213,  fa- 
voured by  Cyrus  ib.  deceived  by 
oracles  ib.  ordered  to  be  slain  by 
Cambyses  269,  how  saved  ib. 

Cuthites,  people  of  Judea,  why  so 
called  122,  odious  name  among  the 
Jews  258. 

Cyaxares  king  of  Media  defeated  by 
the  Scythians  135,  his  death  167.  " 

Cyaxares,  son  of  Astyages  king  oi 
Media,  born  162,  called  Darius  the 
Median  by  Daniel  ib.  succeeds  hi^ 
fathw  203.  calls  Cyrus  to  his  s' 


iMiLV 


iisidiice  lb.  In  declavoJ  kiuij  ol' 
Babylon  220,  223,  his  death  225. 
Cyrus,  his  birth  163,  commands  tlie 
Median  array  204,  his  descent  ib. 
his  education  205,  reduces  Armenia 
206,  his  wars  in  Assyria  207,  routs 
Croesus  211,  his  generosity  212,  takes 
king  Croasus  ib.  his  victories  214, 
conquers  Babylon  215,  highly  lavours 
Daniel  223,  is  king  of  Persia,  Media, 
and  Babylon  225,  favours  Daniel 
226,  his  decree  and  reasons  I'er  re- 
storing the  Jews  228,  decree  for  re- 
building tlie  temple  229,  his  death 
262. 

D. 
Damaratus,  the  Spartan,  serviceable  to 

Xerxes  308. 
Damascus  taken  by  Arbaces  94. 
Daniel,  book  of,  writ  in  Chaldee  and 
Hebrew  26 1  ,the  prophecy  concerning 
Xerxes  332,  the  prophecy  of  seventy 
Aveeks  relating  to  the  Messiah  made 
clear  363,containsthreebranches  390. 
Daniel  carried  into  captivity  by  Nebu- 
diadnezzar  154,  his  greatness  155, 
reveals  the  king's  dream  ib.  his  great 
piety  168,  andfamefor  wisdom  173, 
he  prophesies  to  king  Belshaz  ■:r  217, 
just  before  he  was  slain  ib.  ui  high 
favour  with  Cyrus  223,  his  prophecy 
of  our  Saviour  ib.  263,  prays  for  the 
Jews  ib.  in  the  lion's  den  ib.  favour- 
ed by  Dariui  the  Median  227,  his 
great  age,  death,  and  character  258, 
his  building  in  Susa  260. 
Darics,  money  so  called,  ■when  coined 

224,  its  value  ib.  361,  note. 
Darius  the  Median.      See  Cyaxares. 
Dsaiius,    the  son   of  Hystaspes,  made 
king  of  Persia  by  the  neighing  of  his 
horse  277,  forwards  the  rebuilding  of 
the  temple  280,  his  unsuccessful  ex- 
pedition against  the  Scythians  293, 
invades  India  294,  his  wars  with  the 
Macedonians   and    Greeks   305,   his 
heralds  murdered  in  Greece  306,  his 
losses    in    Greece,    disposes    of   his 
crown  308,  death  309,  high  priest  of 
the  Magians  327. 
David,  his  riches  95,413. 
Death  of  princes  foretold  270. 
Decree  for  the  destruction  of  the  Jews, 

procured  by  Haman  411. 
Decrees,  Cyrus'    and  Artaxerxes'  for 
restoring  the  Jews  229,  Darius'  280, 
in  their  favour  by  several  Persian 
kings  354,  note. 
Deioces,  first  king  of  the  Medesll6,  the 
founder  of  Ecbatana  ib.  routed  by 
Nabuchodonosor  126. 
Deuteronomy,  not  all  written  by  Mo- 
.Ps  445— -147. 


Divinaiioii  by  an  ows,  iiow  it)y. 
Drachm  of  gold,  its  value  234. 

E. 
Earth    and    water  demanded   of   the 
Greeks  by  Darius  to  denounce  war 
306. 
East    India  trade,  a  full  account  of  it 
from  David's  time  to  the  present  age 
95—99. 
Ecbatana,  by  whom  founded  116,  taken 
by  Nabuchodonosor  126,  another  city 
270,  Cambyses  deceived  bv  the  name 
ib. 
Eclipse  162. 
Edom,  part  of  the  kingdom  of  Judea9o. 

revolts  97, 98. 
Egypt,  anarchy  there  121,  civil  wars 
Y24,  attacked  by  tlie  Scythians  135,by 
Carnbyses  264,  by  Xerxes  331,  rebels 
against  Artaxerxes  338,  reduced  411. 
Egyptians,    their    barbarous    worship 

267,  vanquished  by  Cambyses  265. 
Elath,   a  port   of  Edom    whence   the 
Jews  traded  to  Ophir  95,  lost  and  re- 
covered 98,  lost  entirely  ib. 
Eli,  his  family  left  out  of  the  pedigree 

of  high  priests  130. 
Eliakim,  minister  of  state  to  Manasseh. 

his  history  122. 
Elohim,  this  word  equally  applicable  to 

false  gods  as  to  the  true  one  147. 
Elulseus,  king  of  Tyre,  his  unfortunate 

wars  with  the  Assyrians  109,  110. 
Esarhaddon  succeeds  his  father  Senna- 
cherib king  of  Assyria,  117,  his  con^ 
auests  122,  prophecies  of  them  122. 
123,  his  death  126. 
Esau  called  Edom,  and  why  101. 
Esdras,  a  book  too  absurd  for  the  Pa- 
pists 432,  written  before    Josephus 
o75,  note. 
Esther,  her  birth    and  education  357, 
first  concubine  to  Artaxerxes  Longi- 
manus  ib.  befriends  Ezra  in  his  corn- 
mission  to  return  to  Jerusalem  360, 
made  queen  361,  her  favourable  re- 
ception by  the  king  4l5 — 419. 
Ethiopians,  their  message  to  Cambyses 

266, 
Evilmerodach  succeeds  liis  father  Ne- 
buchadnezzar 201,  releases  king  Je- 
hoiachin  out  of  prison  ib.  slain  202. 
Ezekiel  carried  into  captivity  by  Nebu- 
chadnezzar 261 ,  called  to  be  a  prophet 
167,  his  vision  of  the  cherubim  ib. 
carried  in  a  vision  from  Babylon  to 
Jerusalem  168,  his  prophecy  against 
Tyre     173,    against     Zeuekiah    ib. 
against  Egypt  178. 
Eziongeber,  a  port  whence  the  Jews 

traded  to  Ophir,  96,  97. 
Ezra,hisample  commission  from  Artax- 
p>-ye=  to  rpturn  to  Jerusalem  360.  hi? 


l-VDKX 


descent  ir.  lus  icawiiiag;  361,  loumey  Hebrew  <;ii;iiacier,  pres-eni,  wlienluv 
to  Jerusalem  and  business  there  ib.         used  44P.,  languagr,  when  it  cease<l 
and  power  ib.  puts  away  the  Jews'         among  the  Jews  453. 

strange  wives  408,rollects  a  praxis  ol  Heresy,  Manichaean,  what  it  was  276. 

the  law  of  Moses  423,  higWy  honour-  Herodotus,  what  he  says  of  Sennacherib 
ed  by  the  Jews  424,  how  he  collected        115, 116,  remarks  on  his  history  197, 


a  correct  edition  of  the  Scriptures  432, 
— 467,  adds  to  it  445,  and  writes  se- 
veral books  447,  changes  the  old  He- 
brew character  into  the  Chaldee  448. 
F. 


198,when  born  331, 
Hestiseus,  tjn-ant  of  Miletus,  his  advice 
in  favour  of  Darius  293,  suspecte<l 
bv  the  Persians  296,  crucified  302, 
his  history  303, 304. 


Fasts  kept  in  memory  of  the  destruction    Hezckiah  succeeds  his  father  Ahaz  105, 


of  Jerusalem  and  tlie  temple  174. 

Fasts  kept  by  the  Jews  in  their  captivi- 
ty 283,  after  their  captivity  37 1 . 

Fathers,  ancient,  tlieir  strange  opinion 
of  the  recovery  of  the  Bible  432. 

Faust,  John,  invents  printing  320,  note. 

Fire  worshipped  by  the  Persian  Magi 
373,  274,  276, 277,  alterations  in  the 
worship  by  Zoroastres  315. 
G. 


begins  a  reformation  106,  his  wars 
108,  refuses  to  pay  tribute  to  the 
Assyrians  ib.  being  sick,  is  miracu- 
lously cured  111,  pro'id  of  his  alliance 
with  the  king  of  Babylon  ib,  Isaiah 
rebukes  him  for  it  112,  and  for  his 
league  with  the  king  of  Egypt  ib.  his 
death  and  honourable  burial  117. 
High  priests,  their  succession  among  the 
Jews  130. 


Gaurs,  the  Persian  Magi  now  so  called    Hilkiah  finds  the  lav,'  of  Moses  137, 432. 


330, 
Gedaliah  made  governor  of  Jadea  by 

Nebuchadnezzar   175,  murdered  by 

the  Jews  176. 
Gelo,  king  of  Sicily,  slays  the  Carthagi 


Hippias,  the  Athenian  tyrant,  revolts  to 

the  Persians  307,  slain  ib, 
Holofernes,  general  of  the  Assyrians, 
destroyed  with  his  army  in  Palestine 
126, 
nian  general,   and  burns  their  fleet    Holy  fire  of  the  temple  described  254, 
336,kills  and  takes  their  mighty  army        255. 

337.  Holy  of  holies  a  place  in  the  temple 

Gemara,  what  430, 431 ,  249. 

Gods,  heathen,  how  they  first  came  to    Hoshea  makes   himself  king  of  Israel 
be  worshipped  274. _  .104,  tributary  to  the  Assyrians  105. 

Gold,  Attic  talent  of,  its  value  294, 395.        favours  the  true  worship  ib,  what 


Gold  and  silver  more  plentiful  in  Solo- 
mon's days  than  now  413,  how  the 
ancient  gold  and  silver  mines  were 
lost  ib. 


said  of  him  on  that  account  in 
Scripture  ib.  joins  with  Sabacon 
against  the  Assyrians  108,  taken 
by  them  and  imprisoned  ib. 


Golden  calf  canied  away  by  the  Assy-  Hugo,  Cardinal,  divides  the  Bible  into 

rians  104.  chapters  441 ,  made  the  first  concor- 

Golden  image,  Nebuchadnezzar's,   its  dance  442. 

size  and  cost  194,  195,  I, 

Grotius,  what  he  says  of  the  book  of  Idolnters,  two  sects  of  them  only  in  the 

Judith  being  a  fable  128,  of  the  book  world  273,  274,  first  worshipped  the 


of  Baruch  16'^ 


H. 


with    the 


Habakkuk,    contemporary 

prophet  Jeremiah  152. 
Haggai  the  prophet  animates  the  Jews 

to  rebuild  tlie  temple  279,  his  death 

310. 


planets  274. 

Idumea,  Arabia  Pelraea,  so  called  102. 
differs  from  the  Idumea  in  Judea  il). 

Jeconiah,  or  Jehoiachin,  succeeds  his 
father,  king  Jehoiakim  160,  his  wick- 
edness ib.  sent  in  chains  to  Babylon 
ib.  released  200,  favoured  ib. 


Hagiographa,  what  parts  of  tlic  Bible  so  Jehoaz  succeeds  his  fnrtlier  king  Josiah 

called  by  the  Jews  434,  438.  145,  his  wicked  reigu  ib.  carried  cap- 

Hamantlie  Amalekite,  fovourite  to  Ar-  tive  into  Egypt  ib. 

taxerxes,  his  slory411 — 418,  presses  Jehoiakim  made  king  ofJudah  by  the 


for  uniformity  412,  his  riches  ib. 
Hamestris,  Xerxes'  wife,  her  cruelty 

345,  not  tlie  same  with  queen  Estlier 

ib. 
Hamilcar,  general  of  the  Carthaginian 

army,     confcdei-ate     with     Xerxes 

■against  Grece -SSC-  slain  336. 


king  of  Egypt  148,  his  wickedness 
151,  slays  Uriah  the  prophet  153,  put 
ju  chains  by  Nebuchadnezzar  154, 
swears  fealty  to  him,  and  is  restored 
ib.  as  wicked  as  ever  156,  persecutes 
the  prophets  157,  rebels  against  Ne- 
hn,.h:ii'np/7;n- 159.  slain  160 


iM)K.V. 


47o 


Jehovaul,  king  of  .fuclah,  loses  Edom 
98. 

Jehoshaphat,  his  trade  for  gold,  97,  uu- 
successlal  ib. 

Jeremiah's  prophecy  of  seventy  years, 
how  fulfilled  225,  282,  292,  of  Baby- 
lon's destruction  287,  342. 

Jeremiah,  when  called  to  the  prophetic 
office  136,  his  mourning  for  king  Jo- 
siah  143,  proclHims  God's  judgments 
against  king  Jehoiakim  151,  his  dan- 
ger and  escape  ib.  prophesies  of  Ne- 
buchadnezzar's invasion  153,  impri- 
soned ib.  employs  Baruch  to  publish 
his  prophecies  154,  hides  himself 
157,  prophesies  against  J econiaii  160, 
ills  propliecies  relating  to  the  Baby- 
lonians 163,  dissuades  Zedekiah  from 
entering  into  a  league  against  Nebu- 
chadnezzar ib.  writes  to  the  Jews  in 
captivity  ib.  denounces  judgments 
against  Semaiah,  who  wi-ote  against 
him  164,  sends  his  prophecies  against 
Babylon  to  that  city  165,  prophesies 
to  Zedekiah  his  captivity  170,  is  im- 
prisoned ib.  again  171,  well  used  by 
order  of  Nebuchadnezzar  175,  carried 
into  Egypt  177,  prophesies  against 
Ihe  Jews  there  179,  conjectures  of 
his  death  ib. 

Jerusalem  besieged  92,  taken  in  the 
reign  of  Ahaz  93,  improved  by  He- 
zekiah  118,  called  Cadytis  149,  how 
called  now  by  the  Turks  and  Arabs 
149, 150,  taken  by  the  king  of  Egypt 
150,  named  tlie  holy  city  by  the 
Asiatics  ib.  taken  by  Nebuchadnez- 
zar 154,  again  160,  plundered  by  hiin 
ib.  again  171,  burnt  ib.  priests  cele- 
brate the  feast  after  the  Babylonish 
captivity  233,  its  distance  from  Baby- 
lon 281,  explanation  of  the  ichnogra- 
phy  of  the  temple  of  236— 238. 

Jeshua,  high  priest  of  the  Jews  after 
their  restoration  228,  his  descent  ib. 
his  death  331. 

Jews  lose  their  trade  in  the  Southern 
sea  98,  their  first  captivity  by  Arba- 
ces  103,  104,  ten  tribes  lost  121,  tri- 
butary to  the  king  of  Egypt  148,  car- 
ried away  captives  by  Nebuchadnez- 
zar 154,  wlien  their  Babylonish  cap- 
tivity commenced  153,  155,161,  170. 
fly  into  Egypt  from  the  Assyrians  177, 
prophecies  about  their  destruction 
fulfilled  181,  pursued  into  E.^ypt  136, 
how  they  evade  the  prophecies  con- 
cerning the  sceptre  departing  from 
Judah  202,  restored  228—233,  some 
of  all  the  tribes  229,their  number  230, 
the  poorest  of  them  return  231,  and 
fewer  innumber  than  those  that  staid 
ib  thev  resettle  ih).  thoronghly  resto- 


red 282,  tlicir  privileges  confirmed 
by  Xerxes  331,  are  in  his  great  army 
333,  held  assemblies  in  Babylon  372, 
Haman  procures  an  order  for  their 
destruction  412,  wretched  historians 
323,  when  driven  out  oi  the  East  by 
the  Turks  432. 

Images,  how  hated  by  the  Jews  397, 
and  note.    • 

Inarus,  prince  of  the  Lybians,  chosen 
king  by  the  Egyptians  353,  defeated 
by  the  Persians  410,  taken  ib.  be- 
headed 422. 

lonians  rebel  against  Darius  298,  3QG 
recover  their  liberty  after  Xerxes' 
defeat  342. 

John  Baptist,  when  he  began  to  preach 
393. 

Josephus,  many  great  mistakes  in  hh 
history  140,  229,  403,  404. 

Josiah  succeeds  his  father  Anion  king 
of  Judah  at  eight  years  old  134,  his 
piety  135,  reigns  over  the  whole 
tribes  136  reforms  them  ib.  rends  his 
clothes  at  hearing  Moses'  law  read 
137,  liis  solemn  celebration  of  the 
passover  138,  his  rash  engagement 
with  the  king  of  Egypt  143,  he  is 
slain  ib.  the  great  mourning  for  him 
145. 

Isaac's  prophecy  of  Esau  fulfilled  97,98. 

Isaiah,  his  prophecies  to  Ahaz  92,  of 
Christ  ib.  his  direction  for  the  cure 
of  king  Hezekiah  110,  111,  rebukes 
that  king's  pride  111,  and  foreign  al- 
liances ib.  his  prophecy  against  Seve- 
chus  king  of  Egypt  112,  of  the  de- 
struction of  Sennacherib's  army  by  ii 
blast  115,  said  to  suffer  martyrdom 
119,  his  ])rophecy  of  the  Babvlo- 
nians  fulfilled  154,  342. 

Ishmael,  his  treachery  175. 

Ithobal,  king  of  Tyre,  his  saying  qi 
the  prophet  Daniel  173. 

Judith,  book  of,  written  in  Chaldee 
127,  various  translations  ib.  altera- 
tions in  them  128,  disputes  about  it: 
281,  133,  undetermined  133. 

Jugajus  king  of  Babylon,  his  reign  109. 
K. 

Kebla,  a  point  of  heaven  to  which  the 
Persians  turn  in  worship  318. 

Kerman  in  Persia,  the  fire  temple  of  the 
Magi  there  still  322. 

Keri  Cetib,  their  original  433,  Avhjit 
they  are  ib.  notes. 

Kings,  how  anointed  255,  256, 
L. 

Laborosoarchod  succeeds  his  fathei- 
Neriglissar  in  the  kingdom  of  Baby- 
lon 207,  his  tyranny  208,  slain  257." 

L'^nida«  fcinp:  of   Sparta  defenrlp  the 


•i74 


iM)i:x. 


straits      ol     Thermopyiffl.       :i«'aiust 
Xerxes  334,  sJain  ib. 
Long  liver?  374. 
Language,  Greek,  ancient  and  modern, 

very  different  459,  460. 
Language,  Hebrew,   treated  of  437 — 
462. 

Law,  oral  and  written,  differently  es- 
teemed by  tlie  Jews  425. 

Law,  oral,  how  conveyed  down  425 — 
428. 

Law,  written,  into  how  many  sections 
divided  436. 

Liturgy,  Zoroastres',  317,  318. 

LucuUus,  his  riches  and  magnificence, 
414,  note. 

M. 

Magi,  one  of  them  usurps  the  Persian 
throne  270,  they  are  murdei-ed  273, 
why  so  called  ib.  worshippers  of  fire 
274,  their  opinions  276,  worship  al- 
tered by  Zoroastres  312 — 319,  their 
learning  320,  their  fire  temple  still 
in  being  321,  called  Gaurs  by  the 
Turks  330,  their  worship  suffered 
by  the  English  at  Bombay  ib. 

Magians,  three  orders  of  priests  among 
them  321. 

Maimonides,  his  good  abridgment  of 
the  Talmud  431. 

Malachi,  his  death  310. 

Manasseh  king  of  Judah,  his  idolatry 
119,  said  to  kill  Isaiah  ib.  carried 
captive  into  Assyria  122,  his  resto- 
ration and  reformation  ib.  fortifies 
.Jerusalem  125,  his  death  134. 

Marathon,  buttle  of  307. 

Mardoc  Empadus  succeeds  his  father 
Belesis  king  of  Babylon  109,  his 
name  in  Scripture  ib.  sends  ambas- 
sadors to  congratulate  Hezekiah  on 
his  recovery  111. 

Mardonius,  Xerxes'  general,  liis  wars 
in  Greece  305,  306,  slain  338. 

Mattaniuh,  son  of  Joaiah,  made  king 
by  Nebuchadnezzar  161,  changes  his 
name  to  Zedekiah  ib. 

Masorites,  Jewish  critics  so  called  453, 
455,  inventors  of  the  vowel  points 
154,  their  profession  466,  whence 
their  name  ib.  their  continuance 
463. 

Masorah,  what  456. 

Medes,  kingdom  of,  founded  116,  their 
treachery  to  the  Scythians  156. 

Megabysus,  the  Persian  disgusted  359, 
wars  in  Egypt  409,  revolts  422,  re- 
conciled to  Artaxerxes  ib.  ill  used 
ib. 

Memphis  besieged  358,  410. 

^Memphis,  called  Mesri,  from  the  grand- 
son of  Noah  150,  magistrates  put  to 
:1e:ithbv  Cambyses  263. 


Memphis  besieged  35b,  410. 

Meroe,  sister  and  wife  to  Cambyst; 
268,  murdered  by  liim  269. 

Messias,  Avhcn  Daniel's  prophecy  of  tlie 
seventy  weeks  concerning  him  begins 
362,  3(J3. 

Messias,  Isaiah  prophecies  of  him  to 
king  Ahaz  92,  Daniel's  prophecy  of 
him  223,  Zoroastres'  329. 

Mesessimordacus  king  of  Babylon  120- 

Metiochus,  son  of  Miltiades,  taken  bj- 
the  Persians,  304,  well  usedib. 

Miletus  taken  by  the  Persiatis  301. 

Miltiades  the  Athenian,  prince  of  the 
Thracian  Chersoncsus  292,  293,  304, 
routs  the  Persians  at  the  battle  of 
Marathon  307. 

Mina  of  silver,  its  value  234. 

Mithridates  the  eunuch  conspires  the 
deatli  of  Xerxes  351. 

Mishnah,  a  book  of  traditional  law, 
preferred  by  the  Jews  to  Moses'  428, 
429,  an  action  concerning  it  428. 

Mithridates  boated  to  death  355. 

Mordecai,  porter  to  Artaxerxes  Longi- 
manus  357,  discovers  a  conspiracy 
against  his  life  409,  offends  Plaman 
411,  on  what  account  414,  415,  re 
presents  the  danger  of  the  Jews  to 
Esther  ib.  in  great  power  418. 

Moses,  the  book  of  his  law  found  137, 
written  copies  of  it  first  taken  by 
commando!  king  Josiah  138. 

Moses,  the  book  of  his  law  found  432, 
a  correct  edition  of  it  by  Ezra  432, 
433,  in  what  manner  434—437. 

Mule,  Cyrus  so  called,  and  why  214. 
N. 

Nabonadius,  king  of  Babylon  209,  Da- 
niel prophesies  to  him  217,  slain  ib. 
Daniel  with  him  just  before  ib. 
Nabonassar,  Belesis  king  of  Babylon 
so  called  in  Scripture  91,  confusions 
after  his  death  1 10, 
Nabopolassar  seizes  the  kingdom  of 
Babylon  139,  marries  Nebuchadnez- 
zar to  the  king  of  Assyria's  daughter 
ib.  takes  Nineveh  ib.  his  death  158. 
Nabuchodonosor,  his  victory  over  the 
Medes  126,  his  revels  upon  it,  ib.  a 
name  common  to  the  kings  of  Baby- 
lon 140. 
Nebuchadnezzar  invades  Palestine  154, 
takes  Jerusalem  ib.  his  conquests 
158,  159,  succeeds  his  father  159. 
his  dream  interpreted  by  Daniel  ib. 
sets  up  the  golden  image  197,  causes 
the  false  prophets  among  the  Jews  to 
l)c  roasted  to  death  104,  overruns 
Egypt  186,  enlarges  and  beautifies 
Babylon  187—199,  the  height  and 
value  of  his  golden  images  195,  his 
palace  and  hanging  gardens  196.  hi-^ 


INDEX. 


4U 


piide  lyy,  iiis  (iisiraction  ib.  restora- 
tion 200,  his  death  ib. 

Nebuzaradau  burns  the  temple  and  city 
of  Jerusalem  174,  uses  Jeremiah  Avell 
175,  his  victories  181,  1S2. 

Necus  succeeds  his  father  Psammitious 
king  of  Egypt  138,  his  atteinpts  in 
navigation  130,  139,  wars  with  the 
king  of  Babylon  143,  his  kind  mes- 
sage to  king  Josiah  146,  147,  beats 
the  Babylonians  148,  makes  Judah 
tributary  ib.  routed  by  Nebuchad- 
nezzar li3,  his  deatli  160. 

Nehelamite,  Semaiah  the,  writes 
against  the  prophet  Jeremiah  164. 

Nehemiah  and  Ivlordecai,  leaders  of 
the  Jews  after  tlieir  restoration  228, 
not  the  same  with  those  mentioned  in 
Esther  229. 

Neriglissar,  son-in-law  to  Nebuchad- 
nezzar, succeeds  him  202,  slain  207, 
his  good  character  ib. 

Nineveh  besieged  by  the  Medes  135, 
taken  and  destroyed  by  the  king  of 
Babylon  139,  prophecies  of  it  fulfil- 
led.140,  its  bigness  139,  140,  now 
called  Mosul,  the  seat  of  tlie  patri- 
arch of  the  Nestorians  139. 

Nitetis,  Cyrus'  wife,  her  story  263,  264. 

Nitocris,  queen  of  Babylon,  her  good 
government  210,  218. 

O. 

Oil,  holy,  wanting  in  the  second  temple 
255. 

Ophir,  the  Jews  trade  for  gold  thither 
95,  the  trade  to  it  the  same  as  to  the 
East  Indies  now  98,  conjectures  about 
its  situation  100, 414.  " 

Oral  laws  highly  esteemed  by  the  Jews 
423,  rejected  by  the  Samaritans  435. 

Oracles,  mysterious,  deceive  king  Croe- 
sus 214. 

Oramasdes,  the  good  god  of  the  Per- 
sians 276. 

Osiris,  the  Egyptian  god,  described 
267. 

Ostanes  the  Magian,  high  priest  in 
Greece  with  Xerxes  340. 

Otanes  the  Persian,  discovers  the  im- 
posture of  Smerdis  272,  273. 


Palestine,  its  southwest  bounds  l58  . 

Palmyra,  what  its  name  was  in  Solo- 
mon's time  150. 

Panthea,  her  love  to  her  husband  112, 
113. 

Pausanius,  king  of  Sparta  commands 
tlie  Grecians  at  the  battle  of  Plataea 
338,  their  fleet  against  the  Persians 
343,  his  treachery  345,  deposed  ib. 
put  to  dpa(h  3-1^, 


Fekali,  king  oi  Samaria,  his  attempts 
against  king  Ahaz  92,  Isaiah's  pro- 
phecy of  him  fulfdled  93. 

Pharaoh  Hophra.     See  Apries. 

Pharaoh  Necho.     See  Necus. 

Phedyma,  wife  to  Smerdis  the  impos- 
tor, king  of  Persia,  discovers  him 
272,  married  to  Darius  278. 

Phraortes,  king  of  Media,  his  defeat 
and  death  134,  135. 

Plataea,  battle  of,  Persians  routed  there 
338. 

Porphyry,  his  saying  of  Daniel's  pro- 
phecies 259. 

Prideattx,  Author  of  the  Connexion 
of  the  Old  and  New  Testaments. 
(Life  of)  5,  letter  from  the  bishop  of 
Worcester  to  tlie  bishop  of  Norwich 
56,  Dr.  Prideaux'  answer  59,  letter 
to  Francis  Gwynn,  Esq.  67. 

Priests,  Jewish,  their  courses  after  tlie 
captivity  231,  rich  vestments  worn 
by  them  234,  barefooted  135. 

Priest,  camp  253. 

Prodicus  tiie  heretic,  a  follower  of 
Zoroastres'  opinions  329. 

Prophecy,  spirit  of,  when  it  ceased  255. 

Prophetical  books  of  Scripture,  when 
first  read  in  the  synagogues  487,  into 
how  many  sections  divided  435. 

Psalms,  cxlvi,  cxlvii,  cxlviii,  by  whom 
said  to  be  written  289. 

Psammenitus  succeeds  his  father  Ama- 
sis  king  of  Egypt  264,  conquered  by 
Cambyses  265. 

Psammis  succeeds  his  father  Necus 
king  of  Egypt  160,  dies  168. 

Psammitichus  makes  himself  king  ol 
Egypt  124,  wars  with  the  Assyrians 
ib.  his  death  138. 

Purim  feast,  the  Jewish  Bacchana'-- 
420. 

Pythius,  his  riches  413. 

Pythagoras,  disciple  of  Zoroastres,  imi- 
tates him  319,  a  mistake  in  history 
concernmg  him  and  his  doctrine  328. 
he  learned  the  doctrine  of  the  im- 
mortality of  the  soul  from  Eoroastre' 
328,  329. 

R. 

Rabbi,  how  long  the  Jewish  doctor.^ 
have  been  so  called  431. 

Red  Sea,  not  so  called  from  its  redne"! 
•  100. 

Regilibus  king  of  Babylon  120. 

Religious  worship  of  any  kind,  the  im- 
piety of  affronting  it  209.  270. 

Reports,  surprising,  of  the  battle  of 
Mycale  and  Paulas  jEmilius  cleared 
up  339. 

B  iver  of  Egypt,  so  called  in  Scriptin-er 
n"^  tlie  Nile  158. 


4-7  G 


LVl^EX, 


Sabacon  the  Etliiopian,  takes  tiie  king 
of  Egypt  and  burns  him  108,  called 
So  in  Scripture  ib.  his  death  1 10,  his 
son  Sevechus  called  Setlion  by  He- 
rodotus, succeeds  him  as  king  of 
Egypt  ib. 

-abians,  planet  worshippers  274,  first 
■worshipped  them  per  Sacella  275,  af- 
ter by  images,  and  why  ib 

Sabians,  image  worshippers  so  called 
274,  275,  what  they  were  ib.  the  sect 
founded  by  the  Babylonians  340. 

Saint  Paul  thought  to  speak  of  Isaiah's 
martyrdom  1  9. 

Salmaneser  succeeds  his  father  Arbaces 
104,  his  names  in  Scripture  ib.  car- 
ries .Teroboam's  golden  calf  from  Be- 
thel ib.  carries  the  Israelites  into  cap- 
tivity 108,  makes  Tobit  his  purveyor 
ib. 

Salathiel,  son  of  Jehoiakim,  is  called 
king  at  Babylon  202. 

Samaria,  Avhen  and  by  whom  peopled 
121,  people  idolaters  123. 

Samaritans  are  refused  a  share  in  re- 
building the  temple  257,  obstruct  it 
272,  humbled  380,  292,  by  Xerxes 
131. 

Sanballat  the  Horonite,  a  friend  to  the 
Samaritans  404, 

Saosduchinus  succeeds  his  father  Esar- 
haddon  king  of  Assyria  126.  See 
Nabuchodonosor. 

Sardis  taken  and  burnt  298,  299. 

Scythians,  their  conquests  in  Media  and 
Asia  135,  driven  out  of  them  156, 
routed  by  Darius  285- 

Sennacherib  succeeds  his  father  Salma- 
neser king  of  Assyria  1 10,  wars  with 
Hezekiah  ib.  who  pays  him  a  great 
tribute  112,  overruns  Egypt  ib.  re- 
tires and  invades  Judea  1 13,  his  blas- 
phemous message  to  king  Hezekiah 
114,  routs  the  Egyptians  and  Ethio- 
pians ib.  his  army  killed  by  an  angel 
in  Judea  115,  that  angel  brought  on 
them  a  hot  wind  ib.  what  Herodotus 
says  of  him  ib.  raises  the  siege  of 
Pelusium  114,  slain  by  his  sons  117. 

Sevechus,  king  of  Egypt,  his  weakness 
and  misfortunes  113,  his  death  117. 

Shcbna,  an  ill  minister  of  Manasseh's, 
removed  122. 

Shechinah,  the  cloud  in  the  temple  247. 

Shekel  of  silver,  its  value  234. 

Shekels  with  Samaritan  diaracters  448. 

Simeonitcs  enlarge  their  borders  118. 

Simon,  father,  reproved  464. 

Sisamenes  an  unjust  judge,  his  punish- 
ment 293. 

^merdis,  brother  of  Cambyse?.  murder- 
ed bv  him  2fi8. 


Smerdis  an  impoitor  succeeds  Oambj 
ses  king  of  Persia  369, 370,  unkind  to 
the  Jews  272,  marries  Cyrus' daugh- 
ter ib.  his  imposture  discovered  273, 
he  is  slain  274. 

Solomon,  his  immense  riches  100,  his 
vast  commerce  95,  96i 

Solomon's  temple,  the  bigness  of  it  240. 

Star  in  Bethleiiem  foretold  by  Zoroas- 
tres  329. 

Surat,  some  of  Zoroastres's  sect  still 
there  330. 

Susa,  Daniel  governor  of  that  province 
178,  city  of,  a  sculpture  of  it  on  one 
the  gates  of  the  temple  289. 

Susanna,  the  elders  tliat  would  have 
corrupted  her  164,  the  history 
doubted  261. 

Syene,  tower  of,  in  Ezekiel,  a  wrong 
translation  186,  note. 

Syria,  kingdom  of,  in  Damascus  de- 
stroyed by  Arbaces  king  of  Assyria 
94. 

T. 

Talmuds,  two,  of  Jerusalem  and  Baby- 
lon 429,  when  completed  430. 

Talmud,  Jewish,  what  it  consists  of  429, 
Maimonides's  abridgment  430. 
annaim,  Jewish  doctors  of  tlie  law  so 

T  called  428,  432. 

Tarshish,  of  its  situation  and  tiade  99, 
in  the  East  Indies  100. 

Tatnai  the  Persian  governor  of  Pales- 
tine, his  kindness  to  the  Jews  280. 

Temple  of  Jerusalem  burnt  twice  on 
the  same  day  of  the  year  175,  the  in- 
credible sums  laid  out  in  building  it 
95,  burnt  175,  rebuilt  by  Cyrus's 
decree  229,  what  each  Jew  paid  to- 
wards it  234,  how  intent  the  Jews 
were  upon  it  236,  second  not  so  mag- 
nificent 33  the  fu-st  238,  improved 
afterward  240,  the  glory  of  the  first, 
in  what  it  consisted  ib.  the  robuilding 
of  it  opposed  by  the  Samaritans  257, 
263,  revived  under  Darius  278,  when 
finished  283. 

Temple  of  Sardis  burnt  by  the  toniau 
Gx-eeks  299,  occasions  great  mischiefs 
ib. 

Testament,  New,  first  divided  into 
verses  by  Robert  Stephens  445. 

Thales,  the  philosopher,  wlien  he  lived 
162,  foretells  an  eclipse  ib. 

Thebes  in  Egypt  called  No-Ammon  in 
Scripture  113,  Nahum's  prophecy  of 
it  113, 1 14,  destroyed  before  Nineveh 
114. 

Themistocles  beats  the  Persians  in  the 
straits  of  Salamis  335,  his  power  en- 
vied by  the  Lacedemonians  346,  ac- 
cused by  them  but  acquitted  ib.  forced 
to  quit  Greece  347,  flies  to  Xerxes  ib. 


INDEX. 


•aiglily  honoured  by  him  348,  escape 
349,  his  geneious  death  359. 
Thermopylae  straits  of,  battle  there  334. 
Thucydides,  his  noble  descent  305,  his 

history  corrected  349. 
Tiberius'  fifteenth  year,  how  reckoned 

393. 
Tiglath  Pileser,  Arbaces   so  called  in 
{scripture  90,  hired  by  king  Ahaz  to 
assist  him  94,  carries  the  Jews  into 
captivity  103,  an  error  of  archbishop 
Ushers  concerning  him  rectified  ib. 
his  death  104. 
Temagoras,  the  Athenian,  sentenced  to 
death,  for  his  adoration  of  the  king  of 
Persia  414,  note. 
Tirhakah  the  Ethiopian  assists  Seve- 
chus  king  of  Egypt  114,  succeeds  him 
117,  his  death  120. 
Tisri,  why  the  first  month  of  tlie  Jewish 

year  233. 
Titus,  his  triumph  for  the  taking  Jeru- 
salem 244. 
Tobit  carried  into  captivity  108,  ad- 
vanced by  the  king  of  Assyria  ib. 
Tobit,  opinions  of  the  book  so  called 
1 14,  first  written  in  Chaldee  ib.  seve- 
ral versions  of  142. 
Trade  carried  on  by  thjp  Jews  95,  lost 

98,  what  it  included  iM 
Trade,  East  India,  how  it  passed  from 
the  Jews  to  the  Syrians,  from  them  to 
the  Tyrians,  from  tliem  to  the  Egyp- 
tians, from  them  to  the  Portuguese, 
and  from  them  to  the  English  and 
Dutch  97,  98. 
Tyre,  Ezekiel's  prophecy  against  it  173, 
when  built  180,  besieged  by  Nebu- 
chadnezzar ib.  taken  183. 
Tyre,  new,  built  in  an  island  184. 
Tyrians,  friends  to  Solomon  96,  take  the 
trade  from  tlie  Jews  and  Syrians  98, 
i'avoured  in  it  by  the  Persians  99,  be- 
siegedand  straitened  by  the  Assyrians 
109,  116,  Isaiah's  prophecy  against 
Ihem  110,  help  theJews  to  rebuild  the 
temple  95,  recover  their  privileges 
207,  governed  by  magistrates  called 
.'iitTetes,  or  judges,  from  the  Hebrew 
gophetim  184. 

U. 

t  niversities,  Jewish  453,    in  Assyria 

372,  note.- 
I' riah  the  prophet  slain  by  king  Jehoi- 

akim  152. 
['rim  and  Thummira  treated  of  247, 

254. 
r  slier,  archbishop,  a  mistake  of  his  in 

.  Iironology    rectified    349,    another 

about  Ahasuerus  352,  another  about 
•    the  seventy  weeks  prophecy  ^85, 386. 
v-or.,    T.  '     H) 


V. 

Vashti  queen  of  Persia,  displeases  Ar- 
taxerxes  356,  discovered  357. 

Vatablus's  first  Latin  Bible  divided  into 
verses,  with  numbers  affixed  445. 

Verse,  a  line  in  prose  440,  note. 

V'erses,  the  reason  of  dividing'the  Scrip- 
ture into  verses  437,  when  begun  by 
the  Jews  438. 

Verses,  whether  distinguished  at  first  as 
now  in  the  Hebrew  Bibles,  or  only 
by  lines  437—441. 

Verses,  when  numbers  added  to  them  in 
the  Hebrew  Bibles  444,  at  first  dis- 
tinguished by  letters  442. 

Vowel  points,  their  original  451 — 466, 
none  in  the  books  used  in  the  Jewish 
synagogues  451,  455. 

W 

Weeks,  seventy,  prophecy  concerning- 
the  coming  oi  our  Saviour  362 — 408, 
differences  about  it  369,  370,  recon- 
ciled 384,  385. 

»*• 
..?'■    X. 

Xantippus  the  Athenian  general   de- 
stroys the  Persian  army  and  fleet  338'. 
his  sticcesses  342. 
Xenophon's  history  preferable  to  He- 
,  rodotus's  for  what  relates  to  Cyrus 

204. 
Xerxes,  a  younger  son  of  Darius,  de- 
mands and  ■x»btains  the  crown  308, 
confirms  the'- Jews' privileges  331,  his 
wars  in  Egypt  ib.  preparations  for 
hiswars  with  the  Greeks  332,  his  pro- 
digious army  332,  333,  enters  Greece 
134,  and  Athens  ib.  frighted  and  re- 
turns ingloriously  336,  his  army  des- 
troyed 338,  and  fleet  ib.  his  great  dis- 
appointment 339,  destroys  the  Gre- 
cian temples,  and  why  340,  a  zealous 
Magian  ib.  returns  to  Susa  341,  de- 
stroys the  temples  of  the  Sabians  ib. 
his  incestuous  love  and  crueltj-  343, 
344,  sets  a  price  on  Themistocles' 
liead  347,  how  he  receives  him  ib. 
weary  of  the  war  with  the  Greeks 
351,  murdered  ib.  supposed  by  Scali- 
ger  to  be  Ahasuerus  353, 

y. 

Year,  the  beginning  of  the  Jewish  233. 

Year,  Chaldean,  three  hundred  and 
sixty-five  days  381,  382,  Arabs  and 
Turks  383,  Jews  and  Greeks  used 
lunar  years  362,  Greek  year  con- 
sisted of  three  hundeed  and  sixtv 
days  ib. 

Years  called  weeks  by  the  Jews  362, 

Years.  Sabbath  of.  how  reckoned  384. 


478 


lyDEX. 


z. 

Zechariah,  his  prophesies  284, 287,  25?, 
381,  382,  his  death  310. 

J2edekiah  king  of  Judah,  his  wcked 
reign  161,  rebels  against  Nebuchad- 
nezzar 169,  will  not  hearken  to  Jere- 
miah 170,  is  taken  piisoner,  and 
bound  in  chains  173,  174. 

Zend,  Zoroastres's  book  so  called,  and 
why  323,  taken  out  of  the  Scripture 
324. 

Zephaniah  contemporary  with  tlie  pro- 
phet Jeremiah  152,  slain  174. 

Zerubbabcl,  one  of  the  leaders  of  the 
Jews  after  the  restoration  22S,  Cyrus' 
governor  of  Judeaib.  his  assistants  lb. 
and  the  prophet  Haggai's  messsages 
to  him  279,  goes  to  Darius  292. 

Zichri  the  Ephraimite  wars  with  kin* 
Ahaz  93. 


Zidonians  help  the  Jews  lo  rebuild  Uic 
temple  262. 

Zocatora  island  supposed  to  be  Ophir 
99. 

Zopyrus,  his  cruel  stratagem  on  himself 
to  serve  Darius  286. 

Zoroastres  the  Persian  prophet,  his 
first  appearance  310,  of  Jewish  de- 

'  scent  311,  serves  Daniel  the  prophet 
312,  alters  the  Magian  religion  ib. 
has  a  Jewish  platform  313 — 315, 
has  Pythagoras  for  his  disciple  319, 
no  magician,  but  a  philosopher  320, 
resides  at  Balch  in  Persia  319,  32i.% 
presents   his  revelations  to    Darius 

323,  his  book  taken  from  Scripture 

324,  325,  slain  ib.  held  in  esteem  by 
the  Greeks367,  Pliny's  saying  of  huii 
ib.  and  others  ib.  said  to  have  fore- 
told the  coming  of  Christ  329. 


IHRECTIONS   FOR   PLACING   THE   PLATES — VOL.  I. 


Portrait,  lo  front  the  title-page. 
Falaestina,  page  91. 
Land  of  Moriah,  page  228. 
Temple  of  Jerusalem,  page  236. 
Graecia  Antiqua,  page  331. 
Map  of  Egypt,  page  358. 


i.'i 


:7. 


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